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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Memoirs of Louis XIV., Volume 10
+by Duc de Saint-Simon
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: The Memoirs of Louis XIV., Volume 10
+       And His Court and of The Regency
+
+Author: Duc de Saint-Simon
+
+Release Date: December 3, 2004 [EBook #3869]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE MEMOIRS OF LOUIS XIV., ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by David Widger
+
+
+
+
+
+          MEMOIRS OF LOUIS XIV AND HIS COURT AND OF THE REGENCY
+
+                        BY THE DUKE OF SAINT-SIMON
+
+
+
+
+VOLUME 10.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LXX
+
+The reign of Louis XIV. was approaching its conclusion, so that there is
+now nothing more to relate but what passed during the last month of his
+life, and scarcely so much.  These events, indeed, so curious and so
+important, are so mixed up with those that immediately followed the
+King's death, that they cannot be separated from them.  It will be
+interesting and is necessary to describe the projects, the thoughts, the
+difficulties, the different resolutions, which occupied the brain of the
+Prince, who, despite the efforts of Madame de Maintenon and M. du Maine,
+was of necessity about to be called to the head of affairs during the
+minority of the young King.  This is the place, therefore, to explain all
+these things, after which we will resume the narrative of the last month
+of the King's life, and go on to the events which followed his death.
+
+But, as I have said, before entering upon this thorny path, it will be as
+well to make known, if possible, the chief personage of the story, the
+impediments interior and exterior in his path, and all that personally
+belonged to him.
+
+M. le Duc d'Orleans was, at the most, of mediocre stature, full-bodied
+without being fat; his manner and his deportment were easy and very
+noble; his face was broad and very agreeable, high in colour; his hair
+black, and wig the same.  Although he danced very badly, and had but ill
+succeeded at the riding-school, he had in his face, in his gestures, in
+all his movements, infinite grace, and so natural that it adorned even
+his most ordinary commonplace actions.  With much ease when nothing
+constrained him, he was gentle, affable, open, of facile and charming
+access; the tone of his voice was agreeable, and he had a surprisingly
+easy flow of words upon all subjects which nothing ever disturbed, and
+which never failed to surprise; his eloquence was natural and extended
+even to his most familiar discourse, while it equally entered into his
+observations upon the most abstract sciences, on which he talked most
+perspicuously; the affairs of government, politics, finance, justice,
+war, the court, ordinary conversation, the arts, and mechanics.  He could
+speak as well too upon history and memoirs, and was well acquainted with
+pedigrees.  The personages of former days were familiar to him; and the
+intrigues of the ancient courts were to him as those of his own time.
+To hear him, you would have thought him a great reader.  Not so.  He
+skimmed; but his memory was so singular that he never forgot things,
+names, or dates, cherishing remembrance of things with precision; and his
+apprehension was so good, that in skimming thus it was, with him,
+precisely as though he had read very laboriously.  He excelled in
+unpremeditated discourse, which, whether in the shape of repartee or
+jest, was always appropriate and vivacious.  He often reproached me, and
+others more than he, with "not spoiling him;" but I often gave him praise
+merited by few, and which belonged to nobody so justly as to him; it was,
+that besides having infinite ability and of various kinds, the singular
+perspicuity of his mind was joined to so much exactness, that he would
+never have made a mistake in anything if he had allowed the first
+suggestions of his judgment.  He oftentimes took this my eulogy as a
+reproach, and he was not always wrong, but it was not the less true.
+With all this he had no presumption, no trace of superiority natural or
+acquired; he reasoned with you as with his equal, and struck the most
+able with surprise.  Although he never forgot his own position, nor
+allowed others to forget it, he carried no constraint with him, but put
+everybody at his ease, and placed himself upon the level of all others.
+
+He had the weakness to believe that he resembled Henry IV.  in
+everything, and strove to affect the manners, the gestures, the bearing,
+of that monarch.  Like Henry IV.  he was naturally good, humane,
+compassionate; and, indeed, this man, who has been so cruelly accused of
+the blackest and most inhuman crimes, was more opposed to the destruction
+of others than any one I have ever known, and had such a singular dislike
+to causing anybody pain that it may be said, his gentleness, his
+humanity, his easiness, had become faults; and I do not hesitate to
+affirm that that supreme virtue which teaches us to pardon our enemies he
+turned into vice, by the indiscriminate prodigality with which he applied
+it; thereby causing himself many sad embarrassments and misfortunes,
+examples and proofs of which will be seen in the sequel.
+
+I remember that about a year, perhaps, before the death of the King,
+having gone up early after dinner into the apartments of Madame la
+Duchesse d'Orleans at Marly, I found her in bed with the megrims,
+and M. d'Orleans alone in the room, seated in an armchair at her pillow.
+Scarcely had I sat down than Madame la Duchesse began to talk of some of
+those execrable imputations concerning M. d'Orleans unceasingly
+circulated by Madame de Maintenon and M. du Maine; and of an incident
+arising therefrom, in which the Prince and the Cardinal de Rohan had
+played a part against M. d'Orleans.  I sympathised with her all the more
+because the Duke, I knew not why, had always distinguished and courted
+those two brothers, and thought he could count upon them.  "And what will
+you say of M. d'Orleans," added the Duchesse, "when I tell you that since
+he has known this, known it beyond doubt, he treats them exactly the same
+as before?"
+
+I looked at M. d'Orleans, who had uttered only a few words to confirm the
+story, as it was being told, and who was negligently lolling in his
+chair, and I said to him with warmth:
+
+"Oh, as to that, Monsieur, the truth must be told; since Louis the
+Debonnaire, never has there been such a Debonnaire as you."
+
+At these words he rose in his chair, red with anger to the very whites of
+his eyes, and blurted out his vexation against me for abusing him, as he
+pretended, and against Madame la Duchesse d'Orleans for encouraging me
+and laughing at him.
+
+"Go on," said I, "treat your enemies well, and rail at your friends.  I
+am delighted to see you angry.  It is a sign that I have touched the sore
+point, when you press the finger on it the patient cries.  I should like
+to squeeze out all the matter, and after that you would be quite another
+man, and differently esteemed."
+
+He grumbled a little more, and then calmed down.  This was one of two
+occasions only, on which he was ever really angry with me.
+
+Two or three years after the death of the King, I was chatting in one of
+the grand rooms of the Tuileries, where the Council of the Regency was,
+according to custom, soon to be held, and M. d'Orleans at the other end
+was talking to some one in a window recess.  I heard myself called from
+mouth to mouth, and was told that M. d'Orleans wished to speak to me.
+This often happened before the Council.  I went therefore to the window
+where he was standing.  I found a serious bearing, a concentrated manner,
+an angry face, and was much surprised.
+
+"Monsieur," said he to me at once, "I have a serious complaint against
+you; you, whom I have always regarded as my best of friends."
+
+"Against me!  Monsieur!" said I, still more surprised.  "What is the
+matter, then, may I ask?"
+
+"The matter!" he replied with a mien still more angry; "something you
+cannot deny; verses you have made against me."
+
+"I--verses!" was my reply.  "Why, who the devil has been telling you such
+nonsense?  You have been acquainted with me nearly forty years, and do
+you not know, that never in my life have I been able to make a single
+verse--much less verses?"
+
+"No, no, by Heaven," replied he, "you cannot deny these;" and forthwith
+he began to sing to me a street song in his praise, the chorus of which
+was: 'Our Regent is debonnaire, la la, he is debonnaire,' with a burst of
+laughter.
+
+"What!" said I, "you remember it still!" and smiling, I added also,
+"since you are revenged for it, remember it in good earnest."  He kept on
+laughing a long time before going to the Council, and could not hinder
+himself.  I have not been afraid to write this trifle, because it seems
+to me that it paints the man.
+
+M. d'Orleans loved liberty, and as much for others as for himself.  He
+extolled England to me one day on this account, as a country where there
+are no banishments, no lettres de cachet, and where the King may close
+the door of his palace to anybody, but can keep no one in prison; and
+thereupon related to me with enjoyment, that besides the Duchess of
+Portsmouth, Charles the Second had many subordinate mistresses; that the
+Grand Prieur, young and amiable in those days, driven out of France for
+some folly, had gone to England to pass his exile and had been well
+received by the King.  By way of thanks, he seduced one of those
+mistresses, by whom the King was then so smitten, that he sued for mercy,
+offered money to the Grand Prieur, and undertook to obtain his
+reconciliation in France.  The Grand Prieur held firm.  Charles
+prohibited him the palace.  He laughed at this, and went every day to the
+theatre, with his conquest, and placed himself opposite the King.  At
+last, Charles, not knowing what to do to deliver himself from his
+tormentor, begged our King to recall him, and this was done.  But the
+Grand Prieur said he was very comfortable in England and continued his
+game.  Charles, outraged, confided to the King (Louis XIV.) the state he
+was thrown into by the Grand Prieur, and obtained a command so absolute
+and so prompt, that his tormentor was afterwards obliged to go back into
+France.
+
+M. d'Orleans admired this; and I know not if he would not have wished to
+be the Grand Prieur.  He always related this story with delight.  Thus,
+of ambition for reigning or governing, he had none.  If he made a false
+move in Spain it was because he had been misdirected.  What he would have
+liked best would have been to command armies while war lasted, and divert
+himself the rest of the time without constraint to himself or to others.
+He was, in fact, very fit for this.  With much valour, he had also much
+foresight, judgment, coolness, and vast capacity.  It may be said that he
+was captain, engineer, and army purveyor; that he knew the strength of
+his troops, the names and the company of the officers, and the most
+distinguished of each corps; that he knew how to make himself adored, at
+the same time keeping up discipline, and could execute the most difficult
+things, while unprovided with everything.  Unfortunately there is another
+side of this picture, which it will be as well now to describe.
+
+M. d'Orleans, by disposition so adapted to become the honour and the
+master-piece of an education, was not fortunate in his teachers.  Saint-
+Laurent, to whom he was first confided, was, it is true, the man in all
+Europe best fitted to act as the instructor of kings, but he died before
+his pupil was beyond the birch, and the young Prince, as I have related,
+fell entirely into the hands of the Abbe Dubois.  This person has played
+such an important part in the state since the death of the King, that it
+is fit that he should be made known.  The Abbe Dubois was a little,
+pitiful, wizened, herring-gutted man, in a flaxen wig, with a weazel's
+face, brightened by some intellect.  In familiar terms, he was a regular
+scamp.  All the vices unceasingly fought within him for supremacy, so
+that a continual uproar filled his mind.  Avarice, debauchery, ambition;
+were his gods; perfidy, flattery, foot-licking his means of action;
+complete impiety was his repose; and he held the opinion as a great
+principle, that probity and honesty are chimeras, with which people deck
+themselves, but which have no existence.  In consequence, all means were
+good to him.  He excelled in low intrigues; he lived in them, and could
+not do without them; but they always had an aim, and he followed them
+with a patience terminated only by success, or by firm conviction that he
+could not reach what he aimed at, or unless, as he wandered thus in deep
+darkness, a glimmer of light came to him from some other cranny.  He
+passed thus his days in sapping and counter-sapping.  The most impudent
+deceit had become natural to him, and was concealed under an air that was
+simple, upright, sincere, often bashful.  He would have spoken with grace
+and forcibly, if, fearful of saying more than he wished, he had not
+accustomed himself to a fictitious hesitation, a stuttering--which
+disfigured his speech, and which, redoubled when important things were in
+question, became insupportable and sometimes unintelligible.  He had wit,
+learning, knowledge of the world; much desire to please and insinuate
+himself, but all was spoiled by an odour of falsehood which escaped in
+spite of him through every pore of his body--even in the midst of his
+gaiety, which made whoever beheld it sad.  Wicked besides, with
+reflection, both by nature and by argument, treacherous and ungrateful,
+expert in the blackest villainies, terribly brazen when detected; he
+desired everything, envied everything, and wished to seize everything.
+It was known afterwards, when he no longer could restrain himself, to
+what an extent he was selfish, debauched, inconsistent, ignorant of
+everything, passionate, headstrong, blasphemous and mad, and to what an
+extent he publicly despised his master, the state, and all the world,
+never hesitating to sacrifice everybody and everything to his credit, his
+power, his absolute authority, his greatness, his avarice, his fears, and
+his vengeance.
+
+Such was the sage to whom M. le Duc d'Orleans was confided in early
+youth!
+
+Such a good master did not lose his pains with his new disciple, in whom
+the excellent principles of Saint-Laurent had not had time to take deep
+root, whatever esteem and affection he may have preserved through life
+for that worthy man.  I will admit here, with bitterness, for everything
+should be sacrificed to the truth, that M. le Duc d'Orleans brought into
+the world a failing--let us call things by their names--a weakness, which
+unceasingly spoiled all his talents, and which were of marvellous use to
+his preceptor all his life.  Dubois led him into debauchery, made him
+despise all duty and all decency, and persuaded him that he had too much
+mind to be the dupe of religion, which he said was a politic invention to
+frighten ordinary, intellects, and keep the people in subjection.  He
+filled him too with his favourite principle, that probity in man and
+virtue in woman, are mere chimeras, without existence in anybody except a
+few poor slaves of early training.  This was the basis of the good
+ecclesiatic's doctrines, whence arose the license of falsehood, deceit,
+artifice, infidelity, perfidy; in a word, every villainy, every crime,
+was turned into policy, capacity, greatness, liberty and depth of
+intellect, enlightenment, good conduct, if it could be hidden, and if
+suspicions and common prejudices could be avoided.
+
+Unfortunately all conspired in M. d'Orleans to open his heart and his
+mind to this execrable poison: a fresh and early youth, much strength and
+health, joy at escaping from the yoke as well as vexation at his
+marriage, the wearisomeness produced by idleness, the impulse of his
+passions, the example of other young men, whose vanity and whose interest
+it was to make him live like them.  Thus he grew accustomed to
+debauchery, above all to the uproar of it, so that he could not do
+without it, and could only divert himself by dint of noise, tumult, and
+excess.  It is this which led him often into such strange and such
+scandalous debauches, and as he wished to surpass all his companions, to
+mix up with his parties of pleasure the most impious discourses, and as a
+precious refinement, to hold the most outrageous orgies on the most holy
+days, as he did several times during his Regency on Good Friday, by
+choice, and on other similar days.  The more debauched a man was, the
+more he esteemed him; and I have unceasingly seen him in admiration, that
+reached almost to veneration for the Grand Prieur,--because for forty
+years he had always gone to bed drunk, and had never ceased to keep
+mistresses in the most public manner, and to hold the most impious and
+irreligious discourses.  With these principles, and the conduct that
+resulted from them, it is not surprising that M. le Duc d'Orleans was
+false to such an extent, that he boasted of his falsehood, and plumed
+himself upon being the most skilful deceiver in the world.  He and Madame
+la Duchesse de Berry sometimes disputed which was the cleverer of the
+two; and this in public before M. le Duc de Berry, Madame de Saint-Simon,
+and others!
+
+M. le Duc d'Orleans, following out the traditions of the Palais Royal,
+had acquired the detestable taste and habit of embroiling people one with
+the other, so as to profit by their divisions.  This was one of his
+principal occupations during all the time he was at the head of affairs,
+and one that he liked the best; but which, as soon as discovered,
+rendered him odious, and caused him a thousand annoyances.  He was not
+wicked, far from it; but he could not quit the habits of impiety,
+debauchery, and deceit into which Dubois had led him.  A remarkable
+feature in his character is, that he was suspicious and full of
+confidence at the same time with reference to the very same people.
+
+It is surprising that with all his talents he was totally without honest
+resources for amusing himself.  He was born bored; and he was so
+accustomed to live out of himself, that it was insufferable to him to
+return, incapable as he was of trying even to occupy himself.  He could
+only live in the midst of the movement and torrent of business; at the
+head of an army for instance, or in the cares that arose out of the
+execution of campaign projects, or in the excitement and uproar of
+debauchery.  He began to languish as soon as he was without noise,
+excess, and tumult, the time painfully hanging upon his hands.  He cast
+himself upon painting, when his great fancy for chemistry had passed or
+grown deadened, in consequence of what had been said upon it.  He painted
+nearly all the afternoon at Versailles and at Marly.  He was a good judge
+of pictures, liked them, and made a collection, which in number and
+excellence was not surpassed by those of the Crown.  He amused himself
+afterwards in making composition stones and seals over charcoal, the
+fumes of which often drove me away; and the strongest perfumes, which he
+was fond of all his life, but from which I turned him because the King
+was very much afraid of them, and soon sniffed them.  In fact, never was
+man born with so many talents of all kinds, so much readiness and
+facility in making use of them, and yet never was man so idle, so given
+up to vacuity and weariness.  Thus Madame painted him very happily by an
+illustration from fairy tales, of which she was full.
+
+She said, that all the fairies had been invited to his birth; that all
+came, and that each gave him some talent, so that he had them all.  But,
+unfortunately, an old fairy, who had disappeared so many years ago that
+she was no longer remembered, had been omitted from the invitation lists.
+Piqued at this neglect, she came supported upon her little wand, just at
+the moment when all the rest had endowed the child with their gifts.
+More and more vexed, she revenged herself by rendering useless all the
+talents he had received from the other fairies, not one of which, though
+possessing them all, in consequence of her malediction, was he able to
+make use of.  It must be admitted, that on the whole this is a speaking
+portrait.
+
+One of the misfortunes of this Prince was being incapable of following up
+anything, and an inability to comprehend, even, how any one else could do
+so.  Another, was a sort of insensibility which rendered him indifferent
+to the most mortal and the most dangerous offences; and as the nerve and
+principle of hatred and friendship, of gratitude and vengeance, are the
+same, and as they were wanting in him, the consequences were infinite and
+pernicious.  He was timid to excess, knew it, and was so ashamed that he
+affected to be exactly the reverse, and plumed himself upon his daring.
+But the truth is, as was afterwards seen, nothing could be obtained from
+him, neither grace, nor justice, except by working upon his fears, to
+which he was very susceptible; or by extreme importunity.  He tried to
+put people off by words, then by promises, of which he was monstrously
+prodigal, but which he only kept when made to people who had good firm
+claws.  In this manner he broke so many engagements that the most
+positive became counted as nothing; and he promised moreover to so many
+different people, what could only be given to one, that he thus opened
+out a copious source of discredit to himself and caused much discontent.
+Nothing deceived or injured him more than the opinion he had formed, that
+he could deceive all the world.  He was no longer believed, even when he
+spoke with the best faith, and his facility much diminished the value of
+everything he did.  To conclude, the obscure, and for the most part
+blackguard company, which he ordinarily frequented in his debauches, and
+which he did not scruple publicly to call his roues, drove away all
+decent people, and did him infinite harm.
+
+His constant mistrust of everything and everybody was disgusting, above
+all when he was at the head of affairs.  The fault sprang from his
+timidity, which made him fear his most certain enemies, and treat them
+with more distinction than his friends; from his natural easiness, from a
+false imitation of Henry IV., in whom this quality was by no means the
+finest; and from the unfortunate opinion which he held, that probity was
+a sham.  He was, nevertheless, persuaded of my probity; and would often
+reproach me with it as a fault and prejudice of education which had
+cramped my mind and obscured my understanding, and he said as much of
+Madame de Saint-Simon, because he believed her virtuous.
+
+I had given him so many proofs of my attachment that he could not very
+well suspect me; and yet, this is what happened two or three years after
+the establishment of the Regency.  I give it as one of the most striking
+of the touches that paint his portrait.
+
+It was autumn.  M. d'Orleans had dismissed the councils for a fortnight.
+I profited by this to go and spend the time at La Ferme.  I had just
+passed an hour alone with the Duke, and had taken my leave of him and
+gone home, where in order to be in repose I had closed my door to
+everybody.  In about an hour at most, I was told that Biron, with a
+message from M. le Duc d'Orleans, was at the door, with orders to see me,
+and that he would not go away without.  I allowed Biron to enter, all the
+more surprised because I had just quitted M. le Duc d'Orleans, and
+eagerly asked him the news.  Biron was embarrassed, and in his turn asked
+where was the Marquis de Ruffec (my son).  At this my surprise increased,
+and I demanded what he meant.  Biron, more and more confused, admitted
+that M. le Duc d'Orleans wanted information on this point, and had sent
+him for it.  I replied, that my son was with his regiment at Besancon,
+lodging with M. de Levi, who commanded in Franche-Comte.
+
+"Oh," said Biron, "I know that very well; but have you any letter from
+him?"
+
+"What for?" I asked.
+
+"Because, frankly, since I must tell you all," said he, "M. le Duc
+d'Orleans wishes to see his handwriting."
+
+He added, that soon after I had quitted M. le Duc d'Orleans, whilst he
+was walking at Montmartre ma garden with his 'roues' and his harlots,
+some letters had been brought to him by a post-office clerk, to whom he
+had spoken in private; that afterwards he, Biron, had been called by the
+Duke, who showed him a letter from the Marquis de Ruffec to his master,
+dated "Madrid," and charged him, thereupon, with this present commission.
+
+At this recital I felt a mixture of anger and compassion, and I did not
+constrain myself with Biron.  I had no letters from my son, because I
+used to burn them, as I did all useless papers.  I charged Biron to say
+to M. le Duc d'Orleans a part of what I felt; that I had not the
+slightest acquaintance with anybody in Spain; that I begged him at once
+to despatch a courier there in order to satisfy himself that my son was
+at Besancon.
+
+Biron, shrugging his shoulders, said all that was very good, but that if
+I could find a letter from the Marquis de Ruffec it would be much better;
+adding, that if one turned up and I sent it to him, he would take care
+that it reached M. le Duc d'Orleans, at table, in spite of the privacy of
+his suppers.  I did not wish to return to the Palais Royal to make a
+scene there, and dismissed Biron.  Fortunately, Madame de Saint-Simon
+came in some time after.  I related to her this adventure.  She found the
+last letter of the Marquis de Ruffec, and we sent it to Biron.  It
+reached the table as he had promised.  M. le Duc d'Orleans seized it with
+eagerness.  The joke is that he did not know the handwriting.  Not only
+did he look at the letter, but he read it; and as he found it diverting,
+regaled his company with it; it became the topic of their discourse, and
+entirely removed his suspicions.  Upon my return from La Ferme, I found
+him ashamed of himself, and I rendered him still more so by what I said
+to him on the subject.
+
+I learnt afterwards that this Madrid letter, and others that followed,
+came from a sham Marquis de Ruffec, that is to say, from the son of one
+of Madame's porters, who passed himself off as my son.  He pretended that
+he had quarrelled with me, and wrote to Madame de Saint-Simon, begging
+her to intercede for him; and all this that his letters might be seen,
+and that he might reap substantial benefits from his imposture in the
+shape of money and consideration.  He was a well-made fellow, had much
+address and effrontery, knew the Court very well, and had taken care to
+learn all about our family, so as to speak within limits.  He was
+arrested at Bayonne, at the table of Dadoncourt, who commanded there, and
+who suddenly formed the resolution, suspecting him not to be a gentleman,
+upon seeing him eat olives with a fork!  When in gaol he confessed who he
+was.  He was not new at the trade and was confined some little time.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LXXI
+
+But to return to M. le Duc d'Orleans.
+
+His curiosity, joined to a false idea of firmness and courage, had early
+led him to try and raise the devil and make him speak.  He left nothing
+untried, even the wildest reading, to persuade himself there was no God;
+and yet believed meanwhile in the devil, and hoped to see him and
+converse with him!  This inconsistency is hard to understand, and yet is
+extremely common.  He worked with all sorts of obscure people; and above
+all with Mirepoix, sublieutenant of the Black Musketeers, to find out
+Satan.  They passed whole nights in the quarries of Vanvres and of
+Vaugirard uttering invocations.  M. le Duc d'Orleans, however, admitted
+to me that he had never succeeded in hearing or seeing anything, and at
+last had given up this folly.
+
+At first it was only to please Madame d'Argenton, but afterwards from
+curiosity, that he tried to see the present and the future in a glass of
+water; so he said, and he was no liar.  To be false and to be a liar are
+not one and the same thing, though they closely resemble each other, and
+if he told a lie it was only when hard pressed upon some promise or some
+business, and in spite of himself, so as to escape from a dilemma.
+
+Although we often spoke upon religion, to which I tried to lead him so
+long as I had hope of success, I never could unravel the system he had
+formed for himself, and I ended by becoming persuaded that he wavered
+unceasingly without forming any religion at all.
+
+His passionate desire, like that of his companions in morals, was this,
+that it would turn out that there is no God; but he had too much
+enlightenment to be an atheist; who is a particular kind of fool much
+more rare than is thought.  This enlightenment importuned him; he tried
+to extinguish it and could not.  A mortal soul would have been to him a
+resource; but he could not convince himself of its existence.  A God and
+an immortal soul, threw him into sad straits, and yet he could not blind
+himself to the truth of both the one and the other.  I can say then this,
+I know of what religion he was not; nothing more.  I am sure, however,
+that he was very ill at ease upon this point, and that if a dangerous
+illness had overtaken him, and he had had the time, he would have thrown
+himself into the hands of all the priests and all the Capuchins of the
+town.  His great foible was to pride himself upon his impiety and to wish
+to surpass in that everybody else.
+
+I recollect that one Christmas-time, at Versailles, when he accompanied
+the King to morning prayers and to the three midnight masses, he
+surprised the Court by his continued application in reading a volume he
+had brought with him, and which appeared to be, a prayer book.  The chief
+femme de chambre of Madame la Duchesse d'Orleans, much attached to the
+family, and very free as all good old domestics are, transfixed with joy
+at M. le Duc d'Orleans's application to his book, complimented him upon
+it the next day, in the presence of others.  M. le Duc d'Orleans allowed
+her to go on some time, and then said, "You are very silly, Madame
+Imbert.  Do you know what I was reading?  It was 'Rabelais,' that I
+brought with me for fear of being bored."
+
+The effect of this reply may be imagined.  The thing was too true, and
+was pure braggadocio; for, without comparison of the places, or of the
+things, the music of the chapel was much superior to that of the opera,
+and to all the music of Europe; and at Christmas it surpassed itself.
+There was nothing so magnificent as the decoration of the chapel, or the
+manner in which it was lighted.  It was full of people; the arches of the
+tribune were crowded with the Court ladies, in undress, but ready for
+conquest.  There was nothing so surprising as the beauty of the
+spectacle.  The ears were charmed also.  M. le Duc d'Orleans loved music
+extremely; he could compose, and had amused himself by composing a kind
+of little opera, La Fare writing the words, which was performed before
+the King.  This music of the chapel, therefore, might well have occupied
+him in the most agreeable manner, to say nothing of the brilliant scene,
+without his having recourse to Rabelais.  But he must needs play the
+impious, and the wag.
+
+Madame la Duchesse d'Orleans was another kind of person.  She was tall,
+and in every way majestic; her complexion, her throat, her arms, were
+admirable; she had a tolerable mouth, with beautiful teeth, somewhat
+long; and cheeks too broad, and too hanging, which interfered with, but
+did not spoil, her beauty.  What disfigured her most was her eyebrows,
+which were, as it were, peeled and red, with very little hair; she had,
+however, fine eyelashes, and well-set chestnut-coloured hair.  Without
+being hump-backed or deformed, she had one side larger than the other,
+and walked awry.  This defect in her figure indicated another, which was
+more troublesome in society, and which inconvenienced herself.  She had a
+good deal of intellect, and spoke with much ability.  She said all she
+wished, and often conveyed her meaning to you without directly expressing
+it; saying, as it were, what she did not say.  Her utterance was,
+however, slow and embarrassed, so that unaccustomed ears with difficulty
+followed her.
+
+Every kind of decency and decorum centred themselves in her, and the most
+exquisite pride was there upon its throne.  Astonishment will be felt at
+what I am going to say, and yet, however, nothing is more strictly true:
+it is, that at the bottom of her soul she believed that she, bastard of
+the King, had much honoured M. d'Orleans in marrying him!  M. le Duc
+d'Orleans often laughed at her pride, called her Madame Lucifer, in
+speaking to her, and she admitted that the name did not displease her.
+She always received his advances with coldness, and a sort of superiority
+of greatness.  She was a princess to the backbone, at all hours, and in
+all places.  Yet, at the same time, her timidity was extreme.  The King
+could have made her feel ill with a single severe look; and Madame de
+Maintenon could have done likewise, perhaps.  At all events, Madame la
+Duchesse d'Orleans trembled before her; and upon the most commonplace
+matters never replied to either him or her without hesitation, fear
+printed on her face.
+
+M. le Duc and Madame la Duchesse d'Orleans lived an idle, languishing,
+shameful, indecent, and despised life, abandoned by all the Court.  This,
+I felt, was one of the first things that must be remedied.  Accordingly,
+I induced Madame la Duchesse d'Orleans to make an effort to attract
+people to her table.  She did so, persevering against the coldness and
+aversion she met with, and in time succeeded in drawing a tolerably
+numerous company to her dinners.  They were of exquisite quality, and
+people soon got over their first hesitation, when they found everything
+orderly, free, and unobjectionable.  At these dinners, M. d'Orleans kept
+within bounds, not only in his discourse, but in his behaviour.  But
+oftentimes his ennui led him to Paris, to join in supper parties and
+debauchery.  Madame la Duchesse d'Orleans tried to draw him from these
+pleasures by arranging small parties at her pretty little villa, l'Etoile
+(in the park of Versailles), which the King had given to her, and which
+she had furnished in the most delightful manner.  She loved good cheer,
+the guests loved it also, and at table she was altogether another person
+--free, gay, exciting, charming.  M. le Duc d'Orleans cared for nothing
+but noise, and as he threw off all restraint at these parties, there was
+much difficulty in selecting guests, for the ears of many people would
+have been much confused at his loose talk, and their eyes much astonished
+to see him get drunk at the very commencement of the repast, in the midst
+of those who thought only of amusing and recreating themselves in a
+decent manner, and who never approached intoxication.
+
+As the King became weaker in health, and evidently drew near his end, I
+had continued interviews with Madame d'Orleans upon the subject of the
+Regency, the plan of government to be adopted, and the policy she should
+follow.  Hundreds of times before we had reasoned together upon the
+faults of the Government, and the misfortunes that resulted from them.
+What we had to do was to avoid those faults, educate the young King in
+good and rational maxims, so that when he succeeded to power he might
+continue what the Regency had not had time to finish.  This, at least,
+was my idea; and I laboured hard to make it the idea of M. le Duc
+d'Orleans.  As the health of the King diminished I entered more into
+details; as I will explain.
+
+What I considered the most important thing to be done, was to overthrow
+entirely the system of government in which Cardinal Mazarin had
+imprisoned the King and the realm.  A foreigner, risen from the dregs
+of the people, who thinks of nothing but his own power and his own
+greatness, cares nothing for the state, except in its relation to
+himself.  He despises its laws, its genius, its advantages: he is
+ignorant of its rules and its forms; he thinks only of subjugating all,
+of confounding all, of bringing all down to one level.  Richelieu and his
+successor, Mazarin, succeeded so well in this policy that the nobility,
+by degrees, became annihilated, as we now see them.  The pen and the robe
+people, on the other hand, were exalted; so that now things have reached
+such a pretty pass that the greatest lord is without power, and in a
+thousand different manners is dependent upon the meanest plebeian.  It is
+in this manner that things hasten from one extreme to the other.
+
+My design was to commence by introducing the nobility into the ministry,
+with the dignity and authority due to them, and by degrees to dismiss the
+pen and robe people from all employ not purely judicial.  In this manner
+the administration of public affairs would be entirely in the hands of
+the aristocracy.  I proposed to abolish the two offices of secretary of
+state for the war department, and for foreign affairs, and to supply
+their place by councils; also, that the offices of the navy should be
+managed by a council.  I insisted upon the distinct and perfect
+separation of these councils, so that their authority should never be
+confounded, and the public should never have the slightest trouble in
+finding out where to address itself for any kind of business.
+
+M. le Duc d'Orleans exceedingly relished my project, which we much
+discussed.  This point arrived at, it became necessary to debate upon the
+persons who were to form these councils.  I suggested names, which were
+accepted or set aside, according as they met his approval or
+disapprobation.  "But," said M. le Duc d'Orleans, after we had been a
+long time at this work, "you propose everybody and never say a word of
+yourself.  What do you wish to be?"
+
+I replied, that it was not for me to propose, still less to choose any
+office, but for him to see if he wished to employ me, believing me
+capable, and in that case to determine the place he wished me to occupy.
+This was at Marly, in his chamber, and I shall never forget it.
+
+After some little debate, that between equals would have been called
+complimentary, he proposed to me the Presidency of the Council of
+Finance.  But I had good reasons for shrinking from this office.  I saw
+that disordered as the finances had become there was only one remedy by
+which improvement could be effected; and this was National Bankruptcy.
+Had I occupied the office, I should have been too strongly tempted to
+urge this view, and carry it out, but it was a responsibility I did not
+wish to take upon myself before God and man.  Yet, I felt as I said, that
+to declare the State bankrupt would be the wisest course, and I am bold
+enough to think, that there is not a man, having no personal interest in
+the continuance of imposts, who of two evils, viz., vastly increased
+taxation, and national failure, would not prefer the latter.  We were in
+the condition of a man who unfortunately must choose between passing
+twelve or fifteen years in his bed, in continual pain, or having his leg
+cut off.  Who can doubt this?  he would prefer the loss of his leg by a
+painful operation, in order to find himself two months after quite well,
+free from suffering and in the enjoyment of all his faculties.
+
+I shrunk accordingly from the finances for the reason I have above given,
+and made M. le Duc d'Orleans so angry by my refusal to accept the office
+he had proposed to me, that for three weeks he sulked and would not speak
+to me, except upon unimportant matters.
+
+At the end of that time, in the midst of a languishing conversation, he
+exclaimed, "Very well, then.  You stick to your text, you won't have the
+finances?"
+
+I respectfully lowered my eyes and replied, in a gentle tone, that I
+thought that question was settled.  He could not restrain some
+complaints, but they were not bitter, nor was he angry, and then rising
+and taking a few turns in the room, without saying a word, and his head
+bent, as was his custom when embarrassed, he suddenly spun round upon me,
+and exclaimed, "But whom shall we put there?"
+
+I suggested the Duc de Noailles, and although the suggestion at first met
+with much warm opposition from M. le Duc d'Orleans, it was ultimately
+accepted by him.
+
+The moment after we had settled this point he said to me, "And you! what
+will you be?" and he pressed me so much to explain myself that I said at
+last if he would put me in the council of affairs of the interior, I
+thought I should do better there than elsewhere.
+
+"Chief, then," replied he with vivacity.
+
+"No, no! not that," said I; "simply a place in the council."
+
+We both insisted, he for, I against.  "A place in that council," he said,
+"would be ridiculous, and cannot be thought of.  Since you will not be
+chief, there is only one post which suits you, and which suits me also.
+You must be in the council I shall be in the Supreme Council."
+
+I accepted the post, and thanked him.  From that moment this distinction
+remained fixed.
+
+I will not enter into all the suggestions I offered to M. le Duc
+d'Orleans respecting the Regency, or give the details of all the projects
+I submitted to him.  Many of those projects and suggestions were either
+acted upon only partially, or not acted upon at all, although nearly
+every one met with his approval.  But he was variable as the winds, and
+as difficult to hold.  In my dealings with him I had to do with a person
+very different from that estimable Dauphin who was so rudely taken away
+from us.
+
+But let me, before going further, describe the last days of the King, his
+illness, and death, adding to the narrative a review of his life and
+character.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LXXII
+
+LOUIS XIV. began, as I have before remarked, sensibly to decline, and
+his appetite, which had always been good and uniform, very considerably
+diminished.  Even foreign countries became aware of this.  Bets were laid
+in London that his life would not last beyond the first of September,
+that is to say, about three months, and although the King wished to know
+everything, it may be imagined that nobody was very eager to make him
+acquainted with the news.  He used to have the Dutch papers read to him
+in private by Torcy, often after the Council of State.  One day as Torcy
+was reading, coming unexpectedly--for he had not examined the paper--upon
+the account of these bets, he stopped, stammered, and skipped it.  The
+King, who easily perceived this, asked him the cause of his
+embarrassment; what he was passing over, and why?  Torcy blushed to the
+very whites of his eyes, and said it was a piece of impertinence unworthy
+of being read.  The King insisted; Torcy also: but at last thoroughly
+confused, he could not resist the reiterated command he received, and
+read the whole account of the bets.  The King pretended not to be touched
+by it, but he was, and profoundly, so that sitting down to table
+immediately afterwards, he could not keep himself from speaking of it,
+though without mentioning the gazette.
+
+This was at Marly, and by chance I was there that day.  The King looked
+at me as at the others, but as though asking for a reply.  I took good
+care not to open my mouth, and lowered my eyes.  Cheverny, (a discreet
+man,) too, was not so prudent, but made a long and ill-timed rhapsody
+upon similar reports that had come to Copenhagen from Vienna while he was
+ambassador at the former place seventeen or eighteen years before.  The
+King allowed him to say on, but did not take the bait.  He appeared
+touched, but like a man who does not wish to seem so.  It could be seen
+that he did all he could to eat, and to show that he ate with appetite.
+But it was also seen that the mouthfuls loitered on their way.  This
+trifle did not fail to augment the circumspection of the Court, above all
+of those who by their position had reason to be more attentive than the
+rest.  It was reported that an aide-decamp of Lord Stair, who was then
+English ambassador to our Court, and very much disliked for his insolent
+bearing and his troublesome ways, had caused these bets by what he had
+said in England respecting the health of the King.  Stair, when told
+this, was much grieved, and said 'twas a scoundrel he had dismissed.
+
+As the King sensibly declined I noticed that although terror of him kept
+people as much away from M. d'Orleans as ever, I was approached even by
+the most considerable.  I had often amused myself at the expense of these
+prompt friends; I did so now, and diverted M. d'Orleans by warning him
+beforehand what he had to expect.
+
+On Friday, the 9th of August, 1715, the King hunted the stag after dinner
+in his caleche, that he drove himself as usual.  'Twas for the last time.
+Upon his return he appeared much knocked up.  There was a grand concert
+in the evening in Madame de Maintenon's apartment.
+
+On Saturday, the 10th of August, he walked before dinner in his gardens
+at Marly; he returned to Versailles about six o'clock in the evening, and
+never again saw that strange work of his hands.  In the evening he worked
+with the Chancellor in Madame de Maintenon's rooms, and appeared to
+everybody very ill.  On Sunday, the eleventh of August, he held the
+Council of State, walked, after dinner to Trianon, never more to go out
+again during life.
+
+On the morrow, the 12th of August, he took medicine as usual, and lived
+as usual the following days.  It was known that he complained of sciatica
+in the leg and thigh.  He had never before had sciatica, or rheumatism,
+or a cold; and for a long time no touch of gout.  In the evening there
+was a little concert in Madame de Maintenon's rooms.  This was the last
+time in his life that he walked alone.
+
+On Tuesday, the 13th of August, he made a violent effort, and gave a
+farewell audience to a sham Persian ambassador, whom Pontchartrain had
+imposed upon him; this was the last public action of his life.  The
+audience, which was long, fatigued the King.  He resisted the desire for
+sleep which came over him, held the Finance Council, dined, had himself
+carried to Madame de Maintenon's, where a little concert was given, and
+on leaving his cabinet stopped for the Duchesse de la Rochefoucauld, who
+presented to him the Duchesse de la Rocheguyon, her daughter-in-law, who
+was the last lady presented to him.  She took her tabouret that evening
+at the King's grand supper, which was the last he ever gave.  On the
+morrow he sent some precious stones to the Persian ambassador just
+alluded to.  It was on this day that the Princesse des Ursins set off for
+Lyons, terrified at the state of the King as I have already related.
+
+For more than a year the health of the King had diminished.  His valets
+noticed this first, and followed the progress of the malady, without one
+of them daring to open his mouth.  The bastards, or to speak exactly, M,
+du Maine saw it; Madame de Maintenon also; but they did nothing.  Fagon,
+the chief physician, much fallen off in mind and body, was the only one
+of the King's intimates who saw nothing.  Marechal, also chief physician,
+spoke to him (Fagon) several times, but was always harshly repulsed.
+Pressed at last by his duty and his attachment, he made bold one morning
+towards Whitsuntide to go to Madame de Maintenon.  He told her what he
+saw and how grossly Fagon was mistaken.  He assured her that the, King,
+whose pulse he had often felt, had had for some time a slow internal
+fever; that his constitution was so good that with remedies and attention
+all would go well, but that if the malady were allowed to grow there
+would no longer be any resource.  Madame de Maintenon grew angry, and all
+he obtained for his zeal was her anger.  She said that only the personal
+enemies of Fagon could find fault with his opinion upon the King's
+health, concerning which the capacity, the application, the experience of
+the chief physician could not be deceived.  The best of it is that
+Marechal, who had formerly operated upon Fagon for stone, had been
+appointed chief surgeon by him, and they had always lived on the best of
+terms.  Marechal, annoyed as he related to me, could do nothing more, and
+began from that time to lament the death of his master.  Fagon was in
+fact the first physician in Europe, but for a long time his health had
+not permitted him to maintain his experience; and the high point of
+authority to which his capacity and his favour had carried him, had at
+last spoiled him.  He would not hear reason, or submit to reply, and
+continued to treat the King as he had treated him in early years; and
+killed him by his obstinacy.
+
+The gout of which the King had had long attacks, induced Fagon to swaddle
+him, so to say, every evening in a heap of feather pillows, which made
+him sweat all night to such an extent that it was necessary in the
+morning to rub him down and change his linen before the grand chamberlain
+and the first gentleman of the chamber could enter.  For many years he
+had drunk nothing but Burgundy wine, half mixed with water, and so old
+that it was used up instead of the best champagne which he had used all
+his life.  He would pleasantly say sometimes that foreign lords who were
+anxious to taste the wine he used, were often mightily deceived.  At no
+time had he ever drunk pure wine, or made use in any way of spirits, or
+even tea, coffee, or chocolate.  Upon rising, instead of a little bread
+and wine and water, he had taken for a long time two glasses of sage and
+veronica; often between his meals, and always on going to bed, glasses of
+water with a little orange-flower water in them, and always iced.  Even
+on the days when he had medicine he drank this, and always also at his
+meals, between which he never ate anything except some cinnamon lozenges
+that he put into his pocket at his dessert, with a good many cracknels
+for the bitches he kept in his cabinet.
+
+As during the last year of his life the King became more and more
+costive, Fagon made him eat at the commencement of his repasts many iced
+fruits, that is to say, mulberries, melons, and figs rotten from
+ripeness; and at his dessert many other fruits, finishing with a
+surprising quantity of sweetmeats.  All the year round he ate at supper a
+prodigious quantity of salad.  His soups, several of which he partook of
+morning and evening, were full of gravy, and were of exceeding strength,
+and everything that was served to him was full of spice, to double the
+usual extent, and very strong also.  This regimen and the sweetmeats
+together Fagon did not like, and sometimes while seeing the King eat, he
+would make most amusing grimaces, without daring however to say anything
+except now and then to Livry and Benoist, who replied that it was their
+business to feed the King, and his to doctor him.  The King never ate any
+kind of venison or water-fowl, but otherwise partook of everything, fete
+days and fast days alike, except that during the last twenty years of his
+life he observed some few days of Lent.
+
+This summer he redoubled his regime of fruits and drinks.  At last the
+former clogged his stomach, taken after soup, weakened the digestive
+organs and took away his appetite, which until then had never failed him
+all his life, though however late dinner might be delayed he never was
+hungry or wanted to eat.  But after the first spoonfuls of soup, his
+appetite came, as I have several times heard him say, and he ate so
+prodigiously and so solidly morning and evening that no one could get
+accustomed to see it.  So much water and so much fruit unconnected by
+anything spirituous, turned his blood into gangrene; while those forced
+night sweats diminished its strength and impoverished it; and thus his
+death was caused, as was seen by the opening of his body.  The organs
+were found in such good and healthy condition that there is reason to
+believe he would have lived beyond his hundredth year.  His stomach above
+all astonished, and also his bowels by their volume and extent, double
+that of the ordinary, whence it came that he was such a great yet uniform
+eater.  Remedies were not thought of until it was no longer time, because
+Fagon would never believe him ill, or Madame de Maintenon either; though
+at the same time she had taken good care to provide for her own retreat
+in the case of his death.  Amidst all this, the King felt his state
+before they felt it, and said so sometimes to his valets: Fagon always
+reassured him, but did nothing.  The King was contented with what was
+said to him without being persuaded: but his friendship for Fagon
+restrained him, and Madame de Maintenon still more.
+
+On Wednesday, the 14th of August, the King was carried to hear mass for
+the last time; held the Council of State, ate a meat dinner, and had
+music in Madame de Maintenon's rooms.  He supped in his chamber, where
+the Court saw him as at his dinner; was with his family a short time in
+his cabinet, and went to bed a little after ten.
+
+On Thursday, the Festival of the Assumption, he heard mass in his bed.
+The night had been disturbed and bad.  He dined in his bed, the courtiers
+being present, rose at five and was carried to Madame de Maintenon's,
+where music was played.  He supped and went to bed as on the previous
+evening.  As long as he could sit up he did the same.
+
+On Friday, the 16th of August, the night had been no better; much thirst
+and drink.  The King ordered no one to enter until ten.  Mass and dinner
+in his bed as before; then he was carried to Madame de Maintenon's; he
+played with the ladies there, and afterwards there was a grand concert.
+
+On Saturday, the 17th of August, the night as the preceding.  He held the
+Finance Council, he being in bed; saw people at his dinner, rose
+immediately after; gave audience in his cabinet to the General of the
+order of Sainte-Croix de la Bretonnerie; passed to Madame de Maintenon's,
+where he worked with the Chancellor.  At night, Fagon slept for the first
+time in his chamber.
+
+Sunday, the 18th of August, passed like the preceding days, Fagon
+pretended there had been no fever.  The King held a Council of State
+before and after his dinner; worked afterwards upon the fortifications
+with Pelletier; then passed to Madame de Maintenon's, where there was
+music.
+
+Monday, the 19th, and Tuesday, the 20th of August, passed much as the
+previous days, excepting that on the latter the King supped in his
+dressing-gown, seated in an armchair; and that after this evening he
+never left his room or dressed himself again.  That same day Madame de
+Saint-Simon, whom I had pressed to return, came back from the waters of
+Forges.  The king, entering after supper into his cabinet, perceived her.
+He ordered his chair to be stopped; spoke to her very kindly upon her
+journey and her return; then had himself wheeled on by Bloin into the
+other cabinet.  She was the last Court lady to whom he spoke.  I don't
+count those who were always near him, and who came to him when he could
+no longer leave his room.  Madame de Saint-Simon said to me in the
+evening that she should not have recognised the King if she had met him
+anywhere else.  Yet she had left Marly for Forges only on the 6th of
+July.
+
+On Wednesday, the 21st of August, four physicians saw the King, but took
+care to do nothing except praise Fagon, who gave him cassia.  For some
+days it had been perceived that he ate meat and even bread with
+difficulty, (though all his life he had eaten but little of the latter,
+and for some time only the crumb, because he had no teeth).  Soup in
+larger quantity, hash very light, and eggs compensated him; but he ate
+very sparingly.
+
+On Thursday, the 22nd of August, the King was still worse.  He saw four
+other physicians, who, like the first four, did nothing but admire the
+learned and admirable treatment of Fagon, who made him take towards
+evening some Jesuit bark and water and intended to give him at night,
+ass's milk.  This same day, the King ordered the Duc de la Rochefoucauld
+to bring him his clothes on the morrow, in order that he might choose
+which he would wear upon leaving off the mourning he wore for a son of
+Madame la Duchesse de Lorraine.  He had not been able to quit his chamber
+for some days; he could scarcely eat anything solid; his physician slept
+in his chamber, and yet he reckoned upon being cured, upon dressing
+himself again, and wished to choose his dress!  In like manner there was
+the same round of councils, of work, of amusements.  So true it is, that
+men do not wish to die, and dissimulate from themselves the approach of
+death as long as possible.  Meanwhile, let me say, that the state of the
+King, which nobody was ignorant of, had already changed M. d'Orleans'
+desert into a crowded city.
+
+Friday, the 23rd of August, the night was as usual, the morning also.
+The King worked with Pere Tellier, who tried, but in vain, to make him
+fill up several benefices that were vacant; that is to say, Pere Tellier
+wished to dispose of them himself, instead of leaving them to M. le Duc
+d'Orleans.  Let me state at once, that the feebler the King grew the more
+Pere Tellier worried him; so as not to lose such a rich prey, or miss the
+opportunity of securing fresh creatures for his service.  But he could
+not succeed.  The King declared to him that he had enough to render
+account of to God, without charging himself with this nomination, and
+forbade him to speak again upon the subject.
+
+On Saturday evening, the 24th of August, he supped in his dressing-gown,
+in presence of the courtiers, for the last time.  I noticed that he could
+only swallow liquids, and that he was troubled if looked at.  He could
+not finish his supper, and begged the courtiers to pass on, that is to
+say, go away.  He went to bed, where his leg, on which were several black
+marks, was examined.  It had grown worse lately and had given him much
+pain.  He sent for Pere Tellier and made confession.  Confusion spread
+among the doctors at this.  Milk, and Jesuit bark and water had been
+tried and abandoned in turns; now, nobody knew what to try.  The doctors
+admitted that they believed he had had a slow fever ever since
+Whitsuntide; and excused themselves for doing nothing on the ground that
+he did not wish for remedies.
+
+On Sunday, the 25th of August, no more mystery was made of the King's
+danger.  Nevertheless, he expressly commanded that nothing should be
+changed in the usual order of this day (the fete of St.  Louis), that is
+to say, that the drums and the hautboys, assembled beneath his windows,
+should play their accustomed music as soon as he awoke, and that the
+twenty-four violins should play in the ante-chamber during his dinner.
+He worked afterwards with the Chancellor, who wrote, under his dictation,
+a codicil to his will, Madame de Maintenon being present.  She and M. du
+Maine, who thought incessantly of themselves, did not consider the King
+had done enough for them by his will; they wished to remedy this by a
+codicil, which equally showed how enormously they abused the King's
+weakness in this extremity, and to what an excess ambition may carry us.
+By this codicil the King submitted all the civil and military household
+of the young King to the Duc du Maine, and under his orders to Marechal
+de Villeroy, who, by this disposition became the sole masters of the
+person and the dwelling place of the King, and of Paris, by the troops
+placed in their hands; so that the Regent had not the slightest shadow of
+authority and was at their mercy; certainly liable to be arrested or
+worse, any time it should please M. du Maine.
+
+Soon after the Chancellor left the King, Madame de Maintenon, who
+remained, sent for the ladies; and the musicians came at seven o'clock in
+the evening.  But the King fell asleep during the conversation of the
+ladies.  He awoke; his brain confused, which frightened them and made
+them call the doctors.  They found his pulse so bad that they did not
+hesitate to propose to him, his senses having returned, to take the
+sacrament without delay.  Pere Tellier was sent for; the musicians who
+had just prepared their books and their instruments, were dismissed, the
+ladies also; and in a quarter of an hour from that time, the King made
+confession to Pere Tellier, the Cardinal de Rohan, meanwhile, bringing
+the Holy Sacrament from the chapel, and sending for the Cure and holy
+oils.  Two of the King's chaplains, summoned by the Cardinal, came, and
+seven or eight candlesticks were carried by valets.  The Cardinal said a
+word or two to the King upon this great and last action, during which the
+King appeared very firm, but very penetrated with what he was doing.  As
+soon as he had received Our Saviour and the holy oils, everybody left the
+chamber except Madame de Maintenon and the Chancellor.  Immediately
+afterwards, and this was rather strange, a kind of book or little tablet
+was placed upon the bed, the codicil was presented to the King, and at
+the bottom of it he wrote four or five lines, and restored the document
+to the Chancellor.
+
+After this, the King sent for M. le Duc d'Orleans, showed him much
+esteem, friendship, and confidence; but what is terrible with Jesus
+Christ still upon his lips--the Sacrament he had just received--he
+assured him, he would find nothing in his will with which he would not
+feel pleased.  Then he recommended to him the state and the person of the
+future King.
+
+On Monday, the 26th of August, the King called to him the Cardinals de
+Rohan and de Bissy, protested that he died in the faith, and in
+submission to the Church, then added, looking at them, that he was sorry
+to leave the affairs of the Church as they were; that they knew he had
+done nothing except what they wished; that it was therefore for them to
+answer before God for what he had done; that his own conscience was
+clear, and that he was as an ignorant man who had abandoned himself
+entirely to them.  What a frightful thunderbolt was this to the two
+Cardinals; for this was an allusion to the terrible constitution they had
+assisted Pere Tellier in forcing upon him.  But their calm was superior
+to all trial.  They praised him and said he had done well, and that he
+might be at ease as to the result.
+
+This same Monday, 26th of August, after the two Cardinals had left the
+room, the King dined in his bed in the presence of those who were
+privileged to enter.  As the things were being cleared away, he made them
+approach and addressed to them these words, which were stored up in their
+memory:--"Gentlemen, I ask your pardon for the bad example I have given
+you.  I have much to thank you for the manner in which you have served
+me, and for the attachment and fidelity you have always shown for me.  I
+am very sorry I have not done for you all I should have wished to do; bad
+times have been the cause.  I ask for my grandson the same application
+and the same fidelity you have had for me.  He is a child who may
+experience many reverses.  Let your example be one for all my other
+subjects.  Follow the orders my nephew will give you; he is to govern the
+realm; I hope he will govern it well; I hope also that you will all
+contribute to keep up union, and that if any one falls away you will aid
+in bringing him back.  I feel that I am moved, and that I move you also.
+I ask your pardon.  Adieu, gentlemen, I hope you will sometimes remember
+me."
+
+A short time after he called the Marechal de Villeroy to him, and said he
+had made him governor of the Dauphin.  He then called to him M. le Duc
+and M. le Prince de Conti, and recommended to them the advantage of union
+among princes.  Then, hearing women in the cabinet, questioned who were
+there, and immediately sent word they might enter.  Madame la Duchesse de
+Berry, Madame la Duchesse d'Orleans, and the Princesses of the blood
+forthwith appeared, crying.  The King told them they must not cry thus,
+and said a few friendly words to them, and dismissed them.  They retired
+by the cabinet, weeping and crying very loudly, which caused people to
+believe outside that the King was dead; and, indeed, the rumour spread to
+Paris, and even to the provinces.
+
+Some time after the King requested the Duchesse de Ventadour to bring the
+little Dauphin to him.  He made the child approach, and then said to him,
+before Madame de Maintenon and the few privileged people present, "My
+child, you are going to be a great king; do not imitate me in the taste
+I have had for building, or in that I have had for war; try, on the
+contrary, to be at peace with your neighbours.  Render to God what you
+owe Him; recognise the obligations you are under to Him; make Him
+honoured by your subjects.  Always follow good counsels; try to comfort
+your people, which I unhappily have not done.  Never forget the
+obligation you owe to Madame de Ventadour.  Madame (addressing her), let
+me embrace him (and while embracing him), my dear child, I give you my
+benediction with my whole heart."
+
+As the little Prince was about to be taken off the bed, the King
+redemanded him, embraced him again, and raising hands and eyes to Heaven,
+blessed him once more.  This spectacle was extremely touching.
+
+On Tuesday, the 27th of August, the King said to Madame de Maintenon,
+that he had always heard, it was hard to resolve to die; but that as for
+him, seeing himself upon the point of death, he did not find this
+resolution so difficult to form.  She replied that it was very hard when
+we had attachments to creatures, hatred in our hearts, or restitutions to
+make.  "Ah," rejoined the King, "as for restitutions, to nobody in
+particular do I owe any; but as for those I owe to the realm, I hope in
+the mercy of God."
+
+The night which followed was very agitated.  The King was seen at all
+moments joining his hands, striking his breast, and was heard repeating
+the prayers he ordinarily employed.
+
+On Wednesday morning, the 28th of August, he paid a compliment to Madame
+de Maintenon, which pleased her but little, and to which she replied not
+one word.  He said, that what consoled him in quitting her was that,
+considering the age she had reached, they must soon meet again!
+
+About seven o'clock in the morning, he saw in the mirror two of his
+valets at the foot of the bed weeping, and said to them, "Why do you
+weep?  Is it because you thought me immortal?  As for me, I have not
+thought myself so, and you ought, considering my age, to have been
+prepared to lose me."
+
+A very clownish Provencal rustic heard of the extremity of the King,
+while on his way from Marseilles to Paris, and came this morning to
+Versailles with a remedy, which he said would cure the gangrene.  The
+King was so ill, and the doctors so at their wits' ends, that they
+consented to receive him.  Fagon tried to say something, but this rustic,
+who was named Le Brun, abused him very coarsely, and Fagon, accustomed to
+abuse others, was confounded.  Ten drops of Le Brun's mixture in Alicante
+wine were therefore given to the King about eleven o'clock in the
+morning.  Some time after he became stronger, but the pulse falling again
+and becoming bad, another dose was given to him about four o'clock, to
+recall him to life, they told him.  He replied, taking the mixture, "To
+life or to death as it shall please God."
+
+Le Brun's remedy was continued.  Some one proposed that the King should
+take some broth.  The King replied that it was not broth he wanted, but a
+confessor, and sent for him.  One day, recovering from loss of
+consciousness, he asked Pere Tellier to give him absolution for all his
+sins.  Pere Tellier asked him if he suffered much.  "No," replied the
+King, "that's what troubles me: I should like to suffer more for the
+expiation of my sins."
+
+On Thursday, the 29th of August, he grew a little better; he even ate two
+little biscuits steeped in wine, with a certain appetite.  The news
+immediately spread abroad that the King was recovering.  I went that day
+to the apartments of M. le Duc d'Orleans, where, during the previous
+eight days, there had been such a crowd that, speaking exactly, a pin
+would not have fallen to the ground.  Not a soul was there!  As soon as
+the Duke saw me he burst out laughing, and said, I was the first person
+who had been to see him all the day!  And until the evening he was
+entirely deserted.  Such is the world!
+
+In the evening it was known that the King had only recovered for the
+moment.  In giving orders during the day, he called the young Dauphin
+"the young King."  He saw a movement amongst those around him.  "Why
+not?"  said he, "that does not trouble me."  Towards eight o'clock he
+took the elixir of the rustic.  His brain appeared confused; he himself
+said he felt very ill.  Towards eleven o'clock his leg was examined.  The
+gangrene was found to be in the foot and the knee; the thigh much
+inflamed.  He swooned during this examination.  He had perceived with
+much pain that Madame de Maintenon was no longer near him.  She had in
+fact gone off on the previous day with very dry eyes to Saint-Cyr, not
+intending to return.  He asked for her several times during the day.  Her
+departure could not be hidden.  He sent for her to Saint-Cyr, and she
+came back in the evening.
+
+Friday, August the 30th, was a bad day preceded by a bad night.  The King
+continually lost his reason.  About five o'clock in the evening Madame de
+Maintenon left him, gave away her furniture to the domestics, and went to
+Saint-Cyr never to leave it.
+
+On Saturday, the 31st of August, everything went from bad to worse.  The
+gangrene had reached the knee and all the thigh.  Towards eleven o'clock
+at night the King was found to be so ill that the prayers for the dying
+were said.  This restored him to himself.  He repeated the prayers in a
+voice so strong that it rose above all the other voices.  At the end he
+recognised Cardinal de Rohan, and said to him, "These are the last
+favours of the Church."  This was the last man to whom he spoke.  He
+repeated several times, "Nunc et in hora mortis", then said, "Oh, my God,
+come to my aid: hasten to succour me."
+
+These were his last words.  All the night he was without consciousness
+and in a long agony, which finished on Sunday, the 1st September, 1715,
+at a quarter past eight in the morning, three days before he had
+accomplished his seventy-seventh year, and in the seventy-second of his
+reign.  He had survived all his sons and grandsons, except the King of
+Spain.  Europe never saw so long a reign or France a King so old.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LXXIII
+
+I shall pass over the stormy period of Louis XIV.'s minority.  At twenty-
+three years of age he entered the great world as King, under the most
+favourable auspices.  His ministers were the most skilful in all Europe;
+his generals the best; his Court was filled with illustrious and clever
+men, formed during the troubles which had followed the death of Louis
+XIII.
+
+Louis XIV. was made for a brilliant Court.  In the midst of other men,
+his figure, his courage, his grace, his beauty, his grand mien, even the
+tone of his voice and the majestic and natural charm of all his person,
+distinguished him till his death as the King Bee, and showed that if he
+had only been born a simple private gentlemen, he would equally have
+excelled in fetes, pleasures, and gallantry, and would have had the
+greatest success in love.  The intrigues and adventures which early in
+life he had been engaged in--when the Comtesse de Soissons lodged at the
+Tuileries, as superintendent of the Queen's household, and was the centre
+figure of the Court group--had exercised an unfortunate influence upon
+him: he received those impressions with which he could never after
+successfully struggle.  From this time, intellect, education, nobility of
+sentiment, and high principle, in others, became objects of suspicion to
+him, and soon of hatred.  The more he advanced in years the more this
+sentiment was confirmed in him.  He wished to reign by himself.  His
+jealousy on this point unceasingly became weakness.  He reigned, indeed,
+in little things; the great he could never reach: even in the former,
+too, he was often governed.  The superior ability of his early ministers
+and his early generals soon wearied him.  He liked nobody to be in any
+way superior to him.  Thus he chose his ministers, not for their
+knowledge, but for their ignorance; not for their capacity, but for their
+want of it.  He liked to form them, as he said; liked to teach them even
+the most trifling things.  It was the same with his generals.  He took
+credit to himself for instructing them; wished it to be thought that from
+his cabinet he commanded and directed all his armies.  Naturally fond of
+trifles, he unceasingly occupied himself with the most petty details of
+his troops, his household, his mansions; would even instruct his cooks,
+who received, like novices, lessons they had known by heart for years.
+This vanity, this unmeasured and unreasonable love of admiration, was his
+ruin.  His ministers, his generals, his mistresses, his courtiers, soon
+perceived his weakness.  They praised him with emulation and spoiled him.
+Praises, or to say truth, flattery, pleased him to such an extent, that
+the coarsest was well received, the vilest even better relished.  It was
+the sole means by which you could approach him.  Those whom he liked owed
+his affection for them to their untiring flatteries.  This is what gave
+his ministers so much authority, and the opportunities they had for
+adulating him, of attributing everything to him, and of pretending to
+learn everything from him.  Suppleness, meanness, an admiring, dependent,
+cringing manner--above all, an air of nothingness--were the sole means of
+pleasing him.
+
+This poison spread.  It spread, too, to an incredible extent, in a prince
+who, although of intellect beneath mediocrity, was not utterly without
+sense, and who had had some experience.  Without voice or musical
+knowledge, he used to sing, in private, the passages of the opera
+prologues that were fullest of his praises.
+
+He was drowned in vanity; and so deeply, that at his public suppers--all
+the Court present, musicians also--he would hum these self-same praises
+between his teeth, when the music they were set to was played!
+
+And yet, it must be admitted, he might have done better.  Though his
+intellect, as I have said, was beneath mediocrity, it was capable of
+being formed.  He loved glory, was fond of order and regularity; was by
+disposition prudent, moderate, discreet, master of his movements and his
+tongue.  Will it be believed?  He was also by disposition good and just!
+God had sufficiently gifted him to enable him to be a good King; perhaps
+even a, tolerably great King!  All the evil came to him from elsewhere.
+His early education was so neglected that nobody dared approach his
+apartment.  He has often been heard to speak of those times with
+bitterness, and even to relate that, one evening he was found in the
+basin of the Palais Royal garden fountain, into which he had fallen!  He
+was scarcely taught how to read or write, and remained so ignorant, that
+the most familiar historical and other facts were utterly unknown to him!
+He fell, accordingly, and sometimes even in public, into the grossest
+absurdities.
+
+It was his vanity, his desire for glory, that led him, soon after the
+death of the King of Spain, to make that event the pretext for war; in
+spite of the renunciations so recently made, so carefully stipulated, in
+the marriage contract.  He marched into Flanders; his conquests there
+were rapid; the passage of the Rhine was admirable; the triple alliance
+of England, Sweden, and Holland only animated him.  In the midst of
+winter he took Franche-Comte, by restoring which at the peace of Aix-la-
+Chapelle, he preserved his conquests in Flanders.  All was flourishing
+then in the state.  Riches everywhere.  Colbert had placed the finances,
+the navy, commerce, manufactures, letters even, upon the highest point;
+and this age, like that of Augustus, produced in abundance illustrious
+men of all kinds,-even those illustrious only in pleasures.
+
+Le Tellier and Louvois, his son, who had the war department, trembled at
+the success and at the credit of Colbert, and had no difficulty in
+putting into the head of the King a new war, the success of which caused
+such fear to all Europe that France never recovered from it, and after
+having been upon the point of succumbing to this war, for a long time
+felt the weight and misfortune of it.  Such was the real cause of that
+famous Dutch war, to which the King allowed himself to be pushed, and
+which his love for Madame de Montespan rendered so unfortunate for his
+glory and for his kingdom.  Everything being conquered, everything taken,
+and Amsterdam ready to give up her keys, the King yields to his
+impatience, quits the army, flies to Versailles, and destroys in an
+instant all the success of his arms!  He repaired this disgrace by a
+second conquest, in person, of Franche-Comte, which this time was
+preserved by France.
+
+In 1676, the King having returned into Flanders, took Conde; whilst
+Monsieur took Bouchain.  The armies of the King and of the Prince of
+Orange approached each other so suddenly and so closely, that they found
+themselves front to front near Heurtebise.  According even to the
+admission of the enemy, our forces were so superior to those of the
+Prince of Orange, that we must have gained the victory if we had
+attacked.  But the King, after listening to the opinions of his generals,
+some for, and some against giving battle, decided for the latter, turned
+tail, and the engagement was talked of no more.  The army was much
+discontented.  Everybody wished for battle.  The fault therefore of the
+King made much impression upon the troops, and excited cruel railleries
+against us at home and in the foreign courts.  The King stopped but
+little longer afterwards in the army, although we were only in the month
+of May.  He returned to his mistress.
+
+The following year he returned to Flanders, and took Cambrai; and
+Monsieur besieged Saint-Omer.  Monsieur got the start of the Prince of
+Orange, who was about to assist the place, gave him battle near Corsel,
+obtained a complete victory, immediately took Saint-Omer, and then joined
+the King.  This contrast so affected the monarch that never afterwards
+did he give Monsieur command of an army!  External appearances were
+perfectly kept up, but from that moment the resolution was taken and
+always well sustained.
+
+The year afterwards the King led in person the siege of Ghent.  The peace
+of Nimeguen ended this year the war with Holland, Spain, &c.; and on the
+commencement of the following year, that with the Emperor and the Empire.
+America, Africa, the Archipelago, Sicily, acutely felt the power of
+France, and in 1684 Luxembourg was the price of the delay of the
+Spaniards in fulfilling all the conditions of the peace.  Genoa,
+bombarded, was forced to come in the persons of its doge and four of its
+senators, to sue for peace at the commencement of the following year.
+From this date, until 1688, the time passed in the cabinet less in fetes
+than in devotion and constraint.  Here finishes the apogeum of this
+reign, and the fulness of glory and prosperity.  The great captains, the
+great ministers, were no more, but their pupils remained.  The second
+epoch of the reign was very different from the first; but the third was
+even more sadly dissimilar.
+
+I have related the adventure which led to the wars of this period; how an
+ill-made window-frame was noticed at the Trianon, then building; how
+Louvois was blamed for it; his alarm lest his disgrace should follow; his
+determination to engage the King in a war which should turn him from his
+building fancies.  He carried out his resolve: with what result I have
+already shown.  France was ruined at home; and abroad, despite the
+success of her arms, gained nothing.  On the contrary, the withdrawal of
+the King from Gembloux, when he might have utterly defeated the Prince of
+Orange, did us infinite harm, as I have shown in its place.  The peace
+which followed this war was disgraceful.  The King was obliged to
+acknowledge the Prince of Orange as King of England, after having so long
+shown hatred and contempt for him.  Our precipitation, too, cost us
+Luxembourg; and the ignorance of our plenipotentiaries gave our enemies
+great advantages in forming their frontier.  Such was the peace of
+Ryswick, concluded in September, 1697.
+
+This peace seemed as though it would allow France some breathing time.
+The King was sixty years of age, and had, in his own opinion, acquired
+all sorts of glory.  But scarcely were we at peace, without having had
+time to taste it, than the pride of the King made him wish to astonish
+all Europe by the display of a power that it believed prostrated.  And
+truly he did astonish Europe.  But at what a cost!  The famous camp of
+Compiegne--for 'tis to that I allude--was one of the most magnificent
+spectacles ever seen; but its immense and misplaced prodigality was soon
+regretted.  Twenty years afterwards, some of the regiments who took part
+in it were still in difficulties from this cause.
+
+Shortly afterwards,--by one of the most surprising and unheard-of pieces
+of good fortune, the crown of Spain fell into the hands of the Duc
+d'Anjou, grandson of the King.  It seemed as though golden days had come
+back again to France.  Only for a little time, however, did it seem so.
+Nearly all Europe, as it has been seen, banded against France, to dispute
+the Spanish crown.  The King had lost all his good ministers, all his
+able generals, and had taken good pains they should leave no successors.
+When war came, then, we were utterly unable to prosecute it with success
+or honour.  We were driven out of Germany, of Italy, of the Low
+Countries.  We could not sustain the war, or resolve to make peace.
+Every day led us nearer and nearer the brink of the precipice, the
+terrible depths of which were for ever staring us in the face.  A
+misunderstanding amongst our enemies, whereby England became detached
+from the grand alliance; the undue contempt of Prince Eugene for our
+generals, out of which arose the battle of Denain; saved us from the
+gulf.  Peace came, and a peace, too, infinitely better than that we
+should have ardently embraced if our enemies had agreed amongst
+themselves beforehand.  Nevertheless, this peace cost dear to France, and
+cost Spain half its territory--Spain, of which the King had said not even
+a windmill would he yield!  But this was another piece of folly he soon
+repented of.
+
+Thus, we see this monarch, grand, rich, conquering, the arbiter of
+Europe; feared and admired as long as the ministers and captains existed
+who really deserved the name.  When they were no more, the machine kept
+moving some time by impulsion, and from their influence.  But soon
+afterwards we saw beneath the surface; faults and errors were multiplied,
+and decay came on with giant strides; without, however, opening the eyes
+of that despotic master, so anxious to do everything and direct
+everything himself, and who seemed to indemnify himself for disdain
+abroad by increasing fear and trembling at home.
+
+So much for the reign of this vain-glorious monarch.
+
+Let me touch now upon some other incidents in his career, and upon some
+points in his character.
+
+He early showed a disinclination for Paris.  The troubles that had taken
+place there during his minority made him regard the place as dangerous;
+he wished, too, to render himself venerable by hiding himself from the
+eyes of the multitude; all these considerations fixed him at Saint-
+Germain soon after the death of the Queen, his mother.  It was to that
+place he began to attract the world by fetes and gallantries, and by
+making it felt that he wished to be often seen.
+
+His love for Madame de la Valliere, which was at first kept secret,
+occasioned frequent excursions to Versailles, then a little card castle,
+which had been built by Louis XIII.--annoyed, and his suite still more
+so, at being frequently obliged to sleep in a wretched inn there, after
+he had been out hunting in the forest of Saint Leger.  That monarch
+rarely slept at Versailles more than one night, and then from necessity;
+the King, his son, slept there, so that he might be more in private with
+his mistress, pleasures unknown to the hero and just man, worthy son of
+Saint-Louis, who built the little chateau.
+
+These excursions of Louis XIV. by degrees gave birth to those immense
+buildings he erected at Versailles; and their convenience for a numerous
+court, so different from the apartments at Saint-Germain, led him to take
+up his abode there entirely shortly after the death of the Queen.  He
+built an infinite number of apartments, which were asked for by those who
+wished to pay their court to him; whereas at Saint-Germain nearly
+everybody was obliged to lodge in the town, and the few who found
+accommodation at the chateau were strangely inconvenienced.
+
+The frequent fetes, the private promenades at Versailles, the journeys,
+were means on which the King seized in order to distinguish or mortify
+the courtiers, and thus render them more assiduous in pleasing him.
+
+He felt that of real favours he had not enough to bestow; in order to
+keep up the spirit of devotion, he therefore unceasingly invented all
+sorts of ideal ones, little preferences and petty distinctions, which
+answered his purpose as well.
+
+He was exceedingly jealous of the attention paid him.  Not only did he
+notice the presence of the most distinguished courtiers, but those of
+inferior degree also.  He looked to the right and to the left, not only
+upon rising but upon going to bed, at his meals, in passing through his
+apartments, or his gardens of Versailles, where alone the courtiers were
+allowed to follow him; he saw and noticed everybody; not one escaped him,
+not even those who hoped to remain unnoticed.  He marked well all
+absentees from the Court, found out the reason of their absence, and
+never lost an opportunity of acting towards them as the occasion might
+seem to justify.  With some of the courtiers (the most distinguished), it
+was a demerit not to make the Court their ordinary abode; with others
+'twas a fault to come but rarely; for those who never or scarcely ever
+came it was certain disgrace.  When their names were in any way
+mentioned, "I do not know them," the King would reply haughtily.  Those
+who presented themselves but seldom were thus Characterise: "They are
+people I never see;" these decrees were irrevocable.  He could not bear
+people who liked Paris.
+
+Louis XIV. took great pains to be well informed of all that passed
+everywhere; in the public places, in the private houses, in society and
+familiar intercourse.  His spies and tell-tales were infinite.  He had
+them of all species; many who were ignorant that their information
+reached him; others who knew it; others who wrote to him direct, sending
+their letters through channels he indicated; and all these letters were
+seen by him alone, and always before everything else; others who
+sometimes spoke to him secretly in his cabinet, entering by the back
+stairs.  These unknown means ruined an infinite number of people of all
+classes, who never could discover the cause; often ruined them very
+unjustly; for the King, once prejudiced, never altered his opinion, or so
+rarely, that nothing was more rare.  He had, too, another fault, very
+dangerous for others and often for himself, since it deprived him of good
+subjects.  He had an excellent memory; in this way, that if he saw a man
+who, twenty years before, perhaps, had in some manner offended him, he
+did not forget the man, though he might forget the offence.  This was
+enough, however, to exclude the person from all favour.  The
+representations of a minister, of a general, of his confessor even,
+could not move the King.  He would not yield.
+
+The most cruel means by which the King was informed of what was passing--
+for many years before anybody knew it--was that of opening letters.  The
+promptitude and dexterity with which they were opened passes
+understanding.  He saw extracts from all the letters in which there were
+passages that the chiefs of the post-office, and then the minister who
+governed it, thought ought to go before him; entire letters, too, were
+sent to him, when their contents seemed to justify the sending.  Thus the
+chiefs of the post, nay, the principal clerks were in a position to
+suppose what they pleased and against whom they pleased.  A word of
+contempt against the King or the government, a joke, a detached phrase,
+was enough.  It is incredible how many people, justly or unjustly, were
+more or less ruined, always without resource, without trial, and without
+knowing why.  The secret was impenetrable; for nothing ever cost the King
+less than profound silence and dissimulation.
+
+This last talent he pushed almost to falsehood, but never to deceit,
+pluming himself upon keeping his word,--therefore he scarcely ever gave
+it.  The secrets of others he kept as religiously as his own.  He was
+even flattered by certain confessions and certain confidences; and there
+was no mistress, minister, or favourite, who could have wormed them out,
+even though the secret regarded themselves.
+
+We know, amongst many others, the famous story of a woman of quality,
+who, after having been separated a year from her husband, found herself
+in the family way just as he was on the point of returning from the army,
+and who, not knowing what else to do, in the most urgent manner begged a
+private interview of the King.  She obtained it, and confined to him her
+position, as to the worthiest man in his realm, as she said.  The King
+counselled her to profit by her distress, and live more wisely for the
+future, and immediately promised to retain her husband on the frontier as
+long as was necessary, and to forbid his return under any pretext, and in
+fact he gave orders the same day to Louvois, and prohibited the husband
+not only all leave of absence, but forbade him to quit for a single day
+the post he was to command all the winter.  The officer, who was
+distinguished, and who had neither wished nor asked to be employed all
+the winter upon the frontier, and Louvois, who had in no way thought of
+it, were equally surprised and vexed.  They were obliged, however, to
+obey to the letter, and without asking why; and the King never mentioned
+the circumstance until many years afterwards, when he was quite sure
+nobody could find out either husband or wife, as in fact they never
+could, or even obtain the most vague or the most uncertain suspicion.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LXXIV
+
+Never did man give with better grace than Louis XIV., or augmented so
+much, in this way, the price of his benefits.  Never did man sell to
+better profit his words, even his smiles,--nay, his looks.  Never did
+disobliging words escape him; and if he had to blame, to reprimand, or
+correct, which was very rare, it was nearly always with goodness, never,
+except on one occasion (the admonition of Courtenvaux, related in its
+place), with anger or severity.  Never was man so naturally polite, or of
+a politeness so measured, so graduated, so adapted to person, time, and
+place.  Towards women his politeness was without parallel.  Never did he
+pass the humblest petticoat without raising his hat; even to chamber-
+maids, that he knew to be such, as often happened at Marly.  For ladies
+he took his hat off completely, but to a greater or less extent; for
+titled people, half off, holding it in his hand or against his ear some
+instants, more or less marked.  For the nobility he contented himself by
+putting his hand to his hat.  He took it off for the Princes of the
+blood, as for the ladies.  If he accosted ladies he did not cover himself
+until he had quitted them.  All this was out of doors, for in the house
+he was never covered.  His reverences, more or less marked, but always
+light, were incomparable for their grace and manner; even his mode of
+half raising himself at supper for each lady who arrived at table.
+Though at last this fatigued him, yet he never ceased it; the ladies who
+were to sit down, however, took care not to enter after supper had
+commenced.
+
+If he was made to wait for anything while dressing, it was always with
+patience.  He was exact to the hours that he gave for all his day, with a
+precision clear and brief in his orders.  If in the bad weather of
+winter, when he could not go out, he went to Madame de Maintenon's a
+quarter of an hour earlier than he had arranged (which seldom happened),
+and the captain of the guards was not on duty, he did not fail afterwards
+to say that it was his own fault for anticipating the hour, not that of
+the captain of the guards for being absent.  Thus, with this regularity
+which he never deviated from, he was served with the utmost exactitude.
+
+He treated his valets well, above all those of the household.  It was
+amongst them that he felt most at ease, and that he unbosomed himself the
+most familiarly, especially to the chiefs.  Their friendship and their
+aversion have often had grand results.  They were unceasingly in a
+position to render good and bad offices: thus they recalled those
+powerful enfranchised slaves of the Roman emperors, to whom the senate
+and the great people paid court and basely truckled.  These valets during
+Louis XIV.'s reign were not less courted.  The ministers, even the most
+powerful, openly studied their caprices; and the Princes of the blood,
+nay, the bastards,--not to mention people of lower grade, did the same.
+The majority were accordingly insolent enough; and if you could not avoid
+their insolence, you were forced to put up with it.
+
+The King loved air and exercise very much, as long as he could make use
+of them.  He had excelled in dancing, and at tennis and mall.  On
+horseback he was admirable, even at a late age.  He liked to see
+everything done with grace and address.  To acquit yourself well or ill
+before him was a merit or a fault.  He said that with things not
+necessary it was best not to meddle, unless they were done well.  He was
+very fond of shooting, and there was not a better or more graceful shot
+than he.  He had always, in his cabinet seven or eight pointer bitches,
+and was fond of feeding them, to make himself known to them.  He was very
+fond, too, of stag hunting; but in a caleche, since he broke his arm,
+while hunting at Fontainebleau, immediately after the death of the Queen.
+He rode alone in a species of "box," drawn by four little horses--with
+five or six relays, and drove himself with an address and accuracy
+unknown to the best coachmen.  His postilions were children from ten to
+fifteen years of age, and he directed them.
+
+He liked splendour, magnificence, and profusion in everything: you
+pleased him if you shone through the brilliancy of your houses, your
+clothes, your table, your equipages.  Thus a taste for extravagance and
+luxury was disseminated through all classes of society; causing infinite
+harm, and leading to general confusion of rank and to ruin.
+
+As for the King himself, nobody ever approached his magnificence.  His
+buildings, who could number them?  At the same time, who was there who
+did not deplore the pride, the caprice, the bad taste seen in them?  He
+built nothing useful or ornamental in Paris, except the Pont Royal, and
+that simply by necessity; so that despite its incomparable extent, Paris
+is inferior to many cities of Europe.  Saint-Germain, a lovely spot, with
+a marvellous view, rich forest, terraces, gardens, and water he abandoned
+for Versailles; the dullest and most ungrateful of all places, without
+prospect, without wood, without water, without soil; for the ground is
+all shifting sand or swamp, the air accordingly bad.
+
+But he liked to subjugate nature by art and treasure.
+
+He built at Versailles, on, on, without any general design, the beautiful
+and the ugly, the vast and the mean, all jumbled together.  His own
+apartments and those of the Queen, are inconvenient to the last degree,
+dull, close, stinking.  The gardens astonish by their magnificence, but
+cause regret by their bad taste.  You are introduced to the freshness of
+the shade only by a vast torrid zone, at the end of which there is
+nothing for you but to mount or descend; and with the hill, which is very
+short, terminate the gardens.  The violence everywhere done to nature
+repels and wearies us despite ourselves.  The abundance of water, forced
+up and gathered together from all parts, is rendered green, thick, muddy;
+it disseminates humidity, unhealthy and evident; and an odour still more
+so.  I might never finish upon the monstrous defects of a palace so
+immense and so immensely dear, with its accompaniments, which are still
+more so.
+
+But the supply of water for the fountains was all defective at all
+moments, in spite of those seas of reservoirs which had cost so many
+millions to establish and to form upon the shifting sand and marsh.  Who
+could have believed it?  This defect became the ruin of the infantry
+which was turned out to do the work.  Madame de Maintenon reigned.  M. de
+Louvois was well with her, then.  We were at peace.  He conceived the
+idea of turning the river Eure between Chartres and Maintenon, and of
+making it come to Versailles.  Who can say what gold and men this
+obstinate attempt cost during several years, until it was prohibited by
+the heaviest penalties, in the camp established there, and for a long
+time kept up; not to speak of the sick,--above all, of the dead,--that
+the hard labour and still more the much disturbed earth, caused?  How
+many men were years in recovering from the effects of the contagion!  How
+many never regained their health at all!  And not only the sub-officers,
+but the colonels, the brigadiers and general officers, were compelled to
+be upon the spot, and were not at liberty to absent themselves a quarter
+of an hour from the works.  The war at last interrupted them in 1688, and
+they have never since been undertaken; only unfinished portions of them
+exist which will immortalise this cruel folly.
+
+At last, the King, tired of the cost and bustle, persuaded himself that
+he should like something little and solitary.  He searched all around
+Versailles for some place to satisfy this new taste.  He examined several
+neighbourhoods, he traversed the hills near Saint-Germain, and the vast
+plain which is at the bottom, where the Seine winds and bathes the feet
+of so many towns, and so many treasures in quitting Paris.  He was
+pressed to fix himself at Lucienne, where Cavoye afterwards had a house,
+the view from which is enchanting; but he replied that, that fine
+situation would ruin him, and that as he wished to go to no expense, so
+he also wished a situation which would not urge him into any.  He found
+behind Lucienne a deep narrow valley, completely shut in, inaccessible
+from its swamps, and with a wretched village called Marly upon the slope
+of one of its hills.  This closeness, without drain or the means of
+having any, was the sole merit of the valley.  The King was overjoyed at
+his discovery.  It was a great work, that of draining this sewer of all
+the environs, which threw there their garbage, and of bringing soil
+thither!  The hermitage was made.  At first, it was only for sleeping in
+three nights, from Wednesday to Saturday, two or three times a-year, with
+a dozen at the outside of courtiers, to fill the most indispensable
+posts.
+
+By degrees, the hermitage was augmented, the hills were pared and cut
+down, to give at least the semblance of a prospect; in fine, what with
+buildings, gardens, waters, aqueducts, the curious and well known
+machine, statues, precious furniture, the park, the ornamental enclosed
+forest,--Marly has become what it is to-day, though it has been stripped
+since the death of the King.  Great trees were unceasingly brought from
+Compiegne or farther, three-fourths of which died and were immediately
+after replaced; vast spaces covered with thick wood, or obscure alleys,
+were suddenly changed into immense pieces of water, on which people were
+rowed in gondolas; then they were changed again into forest (I speak of
+what I have seen in six weeks); basins were changed a hundred times;
+cascades the same; carp ponds adorned with the most exquisite painting,
+scarcely finished, were changed and differently arranged by the same
+hands; and this an infinite number of times; then there was that
+prodigious machine just alluded to, with its immense aqueducts, the
+conduit, its monstrous resources solely devoted to Marly, and no longer
+to Versailles; so that I am under the mark in saying that Versailles,
+even, did not cost so much as Marly.
+
+Such was the fate of a place the abode of serpents, and of carrion, of
+toads and frogs, solely chosen to avoid expense.  Such was the bad taste
+of the King in all things, and his proud haughty pleasure in forcing
+nature; which neither the most mighty war, nor devotion could subdue!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LXXV
+
+Let me now speak of the amours of the King in which were even more fatal
+to the state than his building mania.  Their scandal filled all Europe;
+stupefied France, shook the state, and without doubt drew upon the King
+those maledictions under the weight of which he was pushed so near the
+very edge of the precipice, and had the misfortune of seeing his
+legitimate posterity within an ace of extinction in France.  These are
+evils which became veritable catastrophes and which will be long felt.
+
+Louis XIV., in his youth more made for love than any of his subjects--
+being tired of gathering passing sweets, fixed himself at last upon La
+Valliere.  The progress and the result of his love are well known.
+
+Madame de Montespan was she whose rare beauty touched him next, even
+during the reign of Madame de La Valliere.  She soon perceived it, and
+vainly pressed her husband to carry her away into Guienne.  With foolish
+confidence he refused to listen to her.  She spoke to him more in
+earnest.  In vain.  At last the King was listened to, and carried her off
+from her husband, with that frightful hubbub which resounded with horror
+among all nations, and which gave to the world the new spectacle of two
+mistresses at once!  The King took them to the frontiers, to the camps,
+to the armies, both of them in the Queen's coach.  The people ran from
+all parts to look at the three queens; and asked one another in their
+simplicity if they had seen them.  In the end, Madame de Montespan
+triumphed, and disposed of the master and his Court with an eclat that
+knew no veil; and in order that nothing should be wanting to complete the
+licence of this life, M. de Montespan was sent to the Bastille; then
+banished to Guienne, and his wife was appointed superintendent of the
+Queen's household.
+
+The accouchements of Madame de Montespan were public.  Her circle became
+the centre of the Court, of the amusements, of the hopes and of the fears
+of ministers and the generals, and the humiliation of all France.  It was
+also the centre of wit, and of a kind so peculiar, so delicate, and so
+subtle, but always so natural and so agreeable, that it made itself
+distinguished by its special character.
+
+Madame de Montespan was cross, capricious, ill-tempered, and of a
+haughtiness in everything which, readied to the clouds, and from the
+effects of which nobody, not even the King, was exempt.  The courtiers
+avoided passing under her windows, above all when the King was with her.
+They used to say it was equivalent to being put to the sword, and this
+phrase became proverbial at the Court.  It is true that she spared
+nobody, often without other design than to divert the King; and as she
+had infinite wit and sharp pleasantry, nothing was more dangerous than
+the ridicule she, better than anybody, could cast on all.  With that she
+loved her family and her relatives, and did not fail to serve people for
+whom she conceived friendship.  The Queen endured with difficulty her
+haughtiness--very different from the respect and measure with which she
+had been treated by the Duchesse de la Valliere, whom she always loved;
+whereas of Madame de Montespan she would say, "That strumpet will cause
+my death."  The retirement, the austere penitence, and the pious end of
+Madame de Montespan have been already described.
+
+During her reign she did not fail to have causes for jealousy.  There was
+Mademoiselle de Fontange, who pleased the King sufficiently to become his
+mistress.  But she had no intellect, and without that it was impossible
+to maintain supremacy over the King.  Her early death quickly put an end
+to this amour.  Then there was Madame de Soubise, who, by the infamous
+connivance of her husband, prostituted herself to the King, and thus
+secured all sorts of advantages for that husband, for herself, and for
+her children.  The love of the King for her continued until her death,
+although for many years before that he had ceased to see her in private.
+Then there was the beautiful Ludre, demoiselle of Lorraine, and maid of
+honour to Madame, who was openly loved for a moment.  But this amour was
+a flash of lightning, and Madame de Montespan remained triumphant.
+
+Let us now pass to another kind of amour which astonished all the world
+as much as the other had scandalised it, and which the King carried with
+him to the tomb.  Who does not already recognise the celebrated Francoise
+d'Aubigne, Marquise de Maintenon, whose permanent reign did not last less
+than thirty-two years?
+
+Born in the American islands, where her father, perhaps a gentleman, had
+gone to seek his bread, and where he was stifled by obscurity, she
+returned alone and at haphazard into France.  She landed at La Rochelle,
+and was received in pity by Madame de Neuillant, mother of the Marechale
+Duchesse de Navailles, and was reduced by that avaricious old woman to
+keep the keys of her granary, and to see the hay measured out to her
+horses, as I have already related elsewhere.  She came afterwards to
+Paris, young, clever, witty, and beautiful, without friends and without
+money; and by lucky chance made acquaintance with the famous Scarron.  He
+found her amiable; his friends perhaps still more so.  Marriage with this
+joyous and learned cripple appeared to her the greatest and most
+unlooked-for good fortune; and folks who were, perhaps, more in want of a
+wife than he, persuaded him to marry her, and thus raise this charming
+unfortunate from her misery.
+
+The marriage being brought about, the new spouse pleased the company
+which went to Scarron's house.  It was the fashion to go there: people of
+the Court and of the city, the best and most distinguished went.  Scarron
+was not in a state to leave his house, but the charm of his genius, of
+his knowledge, of his imagination, of that incomparable and ever fresh
+gaiety which he showed in the midst of his afflictions, that rare
+fecundity, and that humour, tempered by so much good taste that is still
+admired in his writings, drew everybody there.
+
+Madame Scarron made at home all sorts of acquaintances, which, however,
+at the death of her husband, did not keep her from being reduced to the
+charity of the parish of Saint-Eustace.  She took a chamber for herself
+and for a servant, where she lived in a very pinched manner.  Her
+personal charms by degrees improved her condition.  Villars, father of
+the Marechal; Beuvron, father of D'Harcourt; the three Villarceaux, and
+many others kept her.
+
+This set her afloat again, and, step by step, introduced her to the Hotel
+d'Albret, and thence to the Hotel de Richelieu, and elsewhere; so she
+passed from one house to the other.  In these houses Madame Scarron was
+far from being on the footing of the rest of the company.  She was more
+like a servant than a guest.  She was completely at the beck and call of
+her hosts; now to ask for firewood; now if a meal was nearly ready;
+another time if the coach of so-and-so or such a one had returned; and so
+on, with a thousand little commissions which the use of bells, introduced
+a long time after, differently disposes of.
+
+It was in these houses, principally in the Hotel de Richelieu, much more
+still in the Hotel d'Albret, where the Marechal d'Albret lived in great
+state, that Madame Scarron made the majority of her acquaintances.  The
+Marechal was cousin-german of M. de Montespan, very intimate with him,
+and with Madame de Montespan.  When she became the King's mistress he
+became her counsellor, and abandoned her husband.
+
+To the intimacy between the Marechal d'Albret and Madame de Montespan,
+Madame de Maintenon owed the good fortune she met with fourteen or
+fifteen years later.  Madame de Montespan continually visited the Hotel
+d'Albret, and was much impressed with Madame Scarron.  She conceived a
+friendship for the obliging widow, and when she had her first children by
+the King--M. du Maine and Madame la Duchesse, whom the King wished to
+conceal--she proposed that they should be confided to Madame Scarron.  A
+house in the Marais was accordingly given to her, to lodge in with them,
+and the means to bring them up, but in the utmost secrecy.  Afterwards,
+these children were taken to Madame de Montespan, then shown to the King,
+and then by degrees drawn from secrecy and avowed.  Their governess,
+being established with them at the Court, more and more pleased Madame de
+Montespan, who several times made the King give presents to her.  He, on
+the other hand, could not endure her; what he gave to her, always little,
+was by excess of complaisance and with a regret that he did not hide.
+
+The estate of Maintenon being for sale, Madame de Montespan did not let
+the King rest until she had drawn from him enough to buy it for Madame
+Scarron, who thenceforth assumed its name.  She obtained enough also for
+the repair of the chateau, and then attacked the King for means to
+arrange the garden, which the former owners had allowed to go to ruin.
+
+It was at the toilette of Madame de Montespan that these demands were
+made.  The captain of the guards alone followed the King there.  M. le
+Marechal de Lorges, the truest man that ever lived, held that post then,
+and he has often related to me the scene he witnessed.  The King at first
+turned a deaf ear to the request of Madame de Montespan, and then
+refused.  Annoyed that she still insisted, he said he had already done
+more than enough for this creature; that he could not understand the
+fancy of Madame de Montespan for her, and her obstinacy in keeping her
+after he had begged her so many times to dismiss her; that he admitted
+Madame Scarron was insupportable to him, and provided he never saw her
+more and never heard speak of her, he would open his purse again; though,
+to say truth, he had already given too much to a creature of this kind!
+Never did M. le Marechel de Lorges forget these words; and he has always
+repeated them to me and others precisely as they are given here, so
+struck was he with them, and much more after all that he saw since, so
+astonishing and so contradictory.  Madame de Montespan stopped short,
+very much troubled by having too far pressed the King.
+
+M. du Maine was extremely lame; this was caused, it was said, by a fall
+he had from his nurse's arms.  Nothing done for him succeeded; the
+resolution was then taken to send him to various practicians in Flanders,
+and elsewhere in the realm, then to the waters, among others to Bareges.
+The letters that the governess wrote to Madame de Montespan, giving an
+account of these journeys, were shown to the King.  He thought them well
+written, relished them, and the last ones made his aversion for the
+writer diminish.
+
+The ill-humour of Madame de Montespan finished the work.  She had a good
+deal of that quality, and had become accustomed to give it full swing.
+The King was the object of it more frequently than anybody; he was still
+amorous; but her ill-humour pained him.  Madame de Maintenon reproached
+Madame de Montespan for this, and thus advanced herself in the King's
+favour.  The King, by degrees, grew accustomed to speak sometimes to
+Madame de Maintenon; to unbosom to her what he wished her to say to
+Madame de Montespan; at last to relate to her the chagrin this latter
+caused him, and to consult her thereupon.
+
+Admitted thus into the intimate confidence of the lover and the mistress,
+and this by the King's own doing, the adroit waiting-woman knew how to
+cultivate it, and profited so well by her industry that by degrees she
+supplanted Madame de Montespan, who perceived, too late, that her friend
+had become necessary to the King.  Arrived at this point, Madame de
+Maintenon made, in her turn, complaints to the King of all she had to
+suffer, from a mistress who spared even him so little; and by dint of
+these mutual complaints about Madame de Montespan, Madame de Maintenon at
+last took her place, and knew well how to keep it.
+
+Fortune, I dare not say Providence, which was preparing for the
+haughtiest of kings, humiliation the most profound, the most-public, the
+most durable, the most unheard-of, strengthened more and more his taste
+for this woman, so adroit and expert at her trade; while the continued
+ill-humour and jealousy of Madame de Montespan rendered the new union
+still more solid.  It was this that Madame de Sevigne so prettily paints,
+enigmatically, in her letters to Madame de Grignan, in which she
+sometimes talks of these Court movements; for Madame de Maintenon had
+been in Paris in the society of Madame de Sevigne, of Madame de Coulange,
+of Madame de La Fayette, and had begun to make them feel her importance.
+Charming touches are to be seen in the same style upon the favour, veiled
+but brilliant enjoyed by Madame de Soubise.
+
+It was while the King was in the midst of his partiality for Madame de
+Maintenon that the Queen died.  It was at the same time, too, that the
+ill-humour of Madame de Montespan became more and more insupportable.
+This imperious beauty, accustomed to domineer and to be adored, could not
+struggle against the despair, which the prospect of her fall caused her.
+What carried her beyond all bounds, was that she could no longer disguise
+from herself, that she had an abject rival whom she had supported, who
+owed everything to her; whom she had so much liked that she had several
+times refused to dismiss her when pressed to do so by the King; a rival,
+too, so beneath her in beauty, and older by several years; to feel that
+it was this lady's-maid, not to say this servant, that the King most
+frequently went to see; that he sought only her; that he could not
+dissimulate his uneasiness if he did not find her; that he quitted all
+for her; in fine, that at all moments she (Madame de Montespan) needed
+the intervention of Madame de Maintenon, in order to attract the King to
+reconcile her with him, or to obtain the favours she asked for.  It was
+then, in times so propitious to the enchantress, that the King became
+free by the death of the Queen.
+
+He passed the first few days at Saint-Cloud, at Monsieur's, whence he
+went to Fontainebleau, where he spent all the autumn.  It was there that
+his liking, stimulated by absence, made him find that absence
+insupportable.  Upon his return it is pretended--for we must distinguish
+the certain from that which is not so--it is pretended, I say, that the
+King spoke more freely to Madame de Maintenon, and that she; venturing to
+put forth her strength, intrenched herself behind devotion and prudery;
+that the King did not cease, that she preached to him and made him afraid
+of the devil, and that she balanced his love against his conscience with
+so much art, that she succeeded in becoming what our eyes have seen her,
+but what posterity will never believe she was.
+
+But what is very certain and very true, is, that some time after the
+return of the King from Fontainebleau, and in the midst of the winter
+that followed the death of the Queen (posterity will with difficulty
+believe it, although perfectly true and proved), Pere de la Chaise,
+confessor of the King, said mass at the dead of night in one of the
+King's cabinets at Versailles.  Bontems, governor of Versailles, chief
+valet on duty, and the most confidential of the four, was present at this
+mass, at which the monarch and La Maintenon were married in presence of
+Harlay, Archbishop of Paris, as diocesan, of Louvois (both of whom drew
+from the King a promise that he would never declare this marriage), and
+of Montchevreuil.  This last was a relative and friend of Villarceaux, to
+whom during the summer he lent his house at Montchevreuil, remaining
+there himself, however, with his wife; and in that house Villarceaux kept
+Madame Scarron, paying all the expenses because his relative was poor,
+and because he (Villarceaux) was ashamed to take her to his own home, to
+live in concubinage with her in the presence of his wife whose patience
+and virtue he respected.
+
+The satiety of the honeymoon, usually so fatal, and especially the
+honeymoon of such marriages, only consolidated the favour of Madame de
+Maintenon.  Soon after, she astonished everybody by the apartments given
+to her at Versailles, at the top of the grand staircase facing those of
+the King and on the same floor.  From that moment the King always passed
+some hours with her every day of his life; wherever she might be she was
+always lodged near him, and on the same floor if possible.
+
+What manner of person she was,--this incredible enchantress,--and how she
+governed all-powerfully for more than thirty years, it behoves me now to
+explain!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LXXVI
+
+Madame de Maintenon was a woman of much wit, which the good company, in
+which she had at first been merely suffered, but in which she soon shone,
+had much polished; and ornamented with knowledge of the world, and which
+gallantry had rendered of the most agreeable kind.  The various positions
+she had held had rendered her flattering, insinuating, complaisant,
+always seeking to please.  The need she had of intrigues, those she had
+seen of all kinds, and been mixed up in for herself and for others, had
+given her the taste, the ability, and the habit of them.  Incomparable
+grace, an easy manner, and yet measured and respectful, which, in
+consequence of her long obscurity, had become natural to her,
+marvellously aided her talents; with language gentle, exact, well
+expressed, and naturally eloquent and brief.  Her best time, for she was
+three or four years older than the King, had been the dainty phrase
+period;--the superfine gallantry days,--in a word, the time of the
+"ruelles," as it was called; and it had so influenced her that she always
+retained evidences of it.  She put on afterwards an air of importance,
+but this gradually gave place to one of devoutness that she wore
+admirably.  She was not absolutely false by disposition, but necessity
+had made her so, and her natural flightiness made her appear twice as
+false as she was.
+
+The distress and poverty in which she had so long lived had narrowed her
+mind, and abased her heart and her sentiments.  Her feelings and her
+thoughts were so circumscribed, that she was in truth always less even
+than Madame Scarron, and in everything and everywhere she found herself
+such.  Nothing was more repelling than this meanness, joined to a
+situation so radiant.
+
+Her flightiness or inconstancy was of the most dangerous kind.  With the
+exception of some of her old friends, to whom she had good reasons for
+remaining faithful, she favoured people one moment only to cast them off
+the next.  You were admitted to an audience with her for instance, you
+pleased her in some manner, and forthwith she unbosomed herself to you as
+though you had known her from childhood.  At the second audience you
+found her dry, laconic, cold.  You racked your brains to discover the
+cause of this change.  Mere loss of time!--Flightiness was the sole
+reason of it.
+
+Devoutness was her strong point; by that she governed and held her place.
+She found a King who believed himself an apostle, because he had all his
+life persecuted Jansenism, or what was presented to him as such.  This
+indicated to her with what grain she could sow the field most profitably.
+
+The profound ignorance in which the King had been educated and kept all
+his life, rendered him from the first an easy prey to the Jesuits.  He
+became even more so with years, when he grew devout, for he was devout
+with the grossest ignorance.  Religion became his weak point.  In this
+state it was easy to persuade him that a decisive and tremendous blow
+struck against the Protestants would give his name more grandeur than any
+of his ancestors had acquired, besides strengthening his power and
+increasing his authority.  Madame de Maintenon was one of those who did
+most to make him believe this.
+
+The revocation of the edict of Nantes, without the slightest pretext or
+necessity, and the various proscriptions that followed it, were the
+fruits of a frightful plot, in which the new spouse was one of the chief
+conspirators, and which depopulated a quarter of the realm, ruined its
+commerce, weakened it in every direction, gave it up for a long time to
+the public and avowed pillage of the dragoons, authorised torments and
+punishments by which so many innocent people of both sexes were killed by
+thousands; ruined a numerous class; tore in pieces a world of families;
+armed relatives against relatives, so as to seize their property and
+leave them to die of hunger; banished our manufactures to foreign lands,
+made those lands flourish and overflow at the expense of France, and
+enabled them to build new cities; gave to the world the spectacle of a
+prodigious population proscribed, stripped, fugitive, wandering, without
+crime, and seeking shelter far from its country; sent to the galleys,
+nobles, rich old men, people much esteemed for their piety, learning, and
+virtue, people well off, weak, delicate, and solely on account of
+religion; in fact, to heap up the measure of horror, filled all the realm
+with perjury and sacrilege, in the midst of the echoed cries of these
+unfortunate victims of error, while so many others sacrificed their
+conscience to their wealth and their repose, and purchased both by
+simulated abjuration, from which without pause they were dragged to adore
+what they did not believe in, and to receive the divine body of the Saint
+of Saints whilst remaining persuaded that they were only eating bread
+which they ought to abhor!  Such was the general abomination born of
+flattery and cruelty.  From torture to abjuration, and from that to the
+communion, there was often only twenty-four hours' distance; and
+executioners were the conductors of the converts and their witnesses.
+Those who in the end appeared to have been reconciled, more at leisure
+did not fail by their flight, or their behaviour, to contradict their
+pretended conversion.
+
+
+[Illustration: The Edict Of Nantes--Painted by Jules Girardet--front2]
+
+
+The King received from all sides news and details of these persecutions
+and of these conversions.  It was by thousands that those who had abjured
+and taken the communion were counted; ten thousand in one place; six
+thousand in another--all at once and instantly.  The King congratulated
+himself on his power and his piety.  He believed himself to have renewed
+the days of the preaching of the Apostles, and attributed to himself all
+the honour.  The bishops wrote panegyrics of him, the Jesuits made the
+pulpit resound with his praises.  All France was filled with horror and
+confusion; and yet there never was so much triumph and joy--never such
+profusion of laudations!  The monarch doubted not of the sincerity of
+this crowd of conversions; the converters took good care to persuade him
+of it and to beatify him beforehand.  He swallowed their poison in long.
+draughts.  He had never yet believed himself so great in the eyes of man,
+or so advanced in the eyes of God, in the reparation of his sins and of
+the scandals of his life.  He heard nothing but eulogies, while the good
+and true Catholics and the true bishops, groaned in spirit to see the
+orthodox act towards error and heretics as heretical tyrants and heathens
+had acted against the truth, the confessors, and the martyrs.  They could
+not, above all, endure this immensity of perjury and sacrilege.  They
+bitterly lamented the durable and irremediable odium that detestable
+measure cast upon the true religion, whilst our neighbours, exulting to
+see us thus weaken and destroy ourselves, profited by our madness, and
+built designs upon the hatred we should draw upon ourselves from all the
+Protestant powers.
+
+But to these spearing truths, the King was inaccessible.  Even the
+conduct of Rome in this matter, could not open his eyes.  That Court
+which formerly had not been ashamed to extol the Saint-Bartholomew, to
+thank God for it by public processions, to employ the greatest masters to
+paint this execrable action in the Vatican; Rome, I say, would not give
+the slightest approbation to this onslaught on the Huguenots.
+
+The magnificent establishment of Saint-Cyr, followed closely upon the
+revocation of the edict of Nantes.  Madame de Montespan had founded at
+Paris an establishment for the instruction of young girls in all sorts of
+fine and ornamental work.  Emulation gave Madame de Maintenon higher and
+vaster views which, whilst gratifying the poor nobility, would cause her
+to be regarded as protectress in whom all the nobility would feel
+interested.  She hoped to smooth the way for a declaration of her
+marriage, by rendering herself illustrious by a monument with which she
+could amuse both the King and herself, and which might serve her as a
+retreat if she had the misfortune to lose him, as in fact it happened.
+
+This declaration of her marriage was always her most ardent desire.  She
+wished above all things to be proclaimed Queen; and never lost sight of
+the idea.  Once she was near indeed upon seeing it gratified.  The King
+had actually given her his word, that she should be declared; and the
+ceremony was forthwith about to take place.  But it was postponed, and
+for ever, by the representations of Louvois to the King.  To this
+interference that minister owed his fall, and under circumstances so
+surprising and so strange, that I cannot do better, I think, than
+introduce an account of them here, by way of episode.  They are all the
+more interesting because they show what an unlimited power Madame de
+Maintenon exercised by subterranean means, and with what patient
+perseverance she undermined her enemies when once she had resolved to
+destroy them.
+
+Lauvois had gained the confidence of the King to such an extent, that he
+was, as I have said, one of the two witnesses of the frightful marriage
+of his Majesty with Madame de Maintenon.  He had the courage to show he
+was worthy of this confidence, by representing to the King the ignominy
+of declaring that marriage, and drew from him his word, that never in his
+life would he do so.
+
+Several years afterwards, Louvois, who took care to be well informed of
+all that passed in the palace, found out that Madame de Maintenon had
+been again scheming in order to be declared Queen; that the King had had
+the weakness to promise she should be, and that the declaration was about
+to be made.  He put some papers in his hand, and at once went straight to
+the King, who was in a very private room.  Seeing Louvois at an
+unexpected hour, he asked him what brought him there.  "Something
+pressing and important," replied Louvois, with a sad manner that
+astonished the King, and induced him to command the valets present to
+quit the room.  They went away in fact, but left the door open, so that
+they could hear all, and see all, too, by the glass.  This was the great
+danger of the cabinets.
+
+The valets being gone, Louvois did not dissimulate from the King his
+mission.  The monarch was often false, but incapable of rising above his
+own falsehood.  Surprised at being discovered, he tried to shuffle out of
+the matter, and pressed by his minister, began to move so as to gain the
+other cabinet where the valets were, and thus deliver himself from this
+hobble.  But Louvois, who perceived what he was about, threw himself on
+his knees and stopped him, drew from his side a little sword he wore,
+presented the handle to the King, and prayed him to kill him on the spot,
+if he would persist in declaring his marriage, in breaking his word, and
+covering himself in the eyes of Europe with infamy.  The King stamped,
+fumed, told Louvois to let him go.  But Louvois squeezed him tighter by
+the legs for fear he should escape; represented to him the shame of what
+he had decided on doing; in a word, succeeded so well, that he drew for
+the second time from the King, a promise that the marriage should never
+be declared.
+
+Madame de Maintenon meanwhile expected every moment to be proclaimed
+Queen.  At the end of some days disturbed by the silence of the King,
+she ventured to touch upon the subject.  The embarrassment she caused the
+King much troubled her.  He softened the affair as much as he could, but
+finished by begging her to think no more of being declared, and never to
+speak of it to him again!  After the first shock that the loss of her
+hopes caused her, she sought to find out to whom she was beholden for it.
+She soon learned the truth; and it is not surprising that she swore to
+obtain Louvois's disgrace, and never ceased to work at it until
+successful.  She waited her opportunity, and undermined her enemy at
+leisure, availing herself of every occasion to make him odious to the
+King.
+
+Time passed.  At length it happened that Louvois, not content with the
+terrible executions in the Palatinate, which he had counselled, wished to
+burn Treves.  He proposed it to the King.  A dispute arose between them,
+but the King would not or could not be persuaded.  It may be imagined
+that Madame de Maintenon did not do much to convince him.
+
+Some days afterwards Louvois, who had the fault of obstinacy, came as
+usual to work with the King in Madame de Maintenon's rooms.  At the end
+of the sitting he said, that he felt convinced that it was scrupulousness
+alone which had hindered the King from consenting to so necessary an act
+as the burning, of Treves, and that he had, therefore, taken the
+responsibility on himself by sending a courier with orders to set fire to
+the place at once.
+
+The King was immediately, and contrary to his nature, so transported with
+anger that he seized the tongs, and was about to make a run at Louvois,
+when Madame de Maintenon placed herself between them, crying, "Oh, Sire,
+what are you going to do?" and took the tongs from his hands.
+
+Louvois, meanwhile, gained the door.  The King cried after him to recall
+him, and said, with flashing eyes: "Despatch a courier instantly with a
+counter order, and let him arrive in time; for, know this: if a single
+house is burned your head shall answer for it."  Louvois, more dead than
+alive, hastened away at once.
+
+Of course, he had sent off no courier.  He said he had, believing that by
+this trick the King, though he might be angry, would be led to give way.
+He had reckoned wrongly, however, as we have seen.
+
+From this time forward Louvois became day by day more distasteful to the
+King.  In the winter of 1690, he proposed that, in order to save expense,
+the ladies should not accompany the King to the siege of Mons.  Madame de
+Maintenon, we may be sure, did not grow more kindly disposed towards him
+after this.  But as it is always the last drop of water that makes the
+glass overflow, so a trifle that happened at this siege, completed the
+disgrace of Louvois.
+
+The King, who plumed himself upon knowing better than anybody the
+minutest military details, walking one day about the camp, found an
+ordinary cavalry guard ill-posted, and placed it differently.  Later the
+same day he again visited by chance the spot, and found the guard
+replaced as at first.  He was surprised and shocked.  He asked the
+captain who had done this, and was told it was Louvois.
+
+"But," replied the King, "did you not tell him 'twas I who had placed
+you?"
+
+"Yes, Sire," replied the captain.  The King piqued, turned towards his
+suite, and said: "That's Louvois's trade, is it not?  He thinks himself a
+great captain, and that he knows everything," and forthwith he replaced
+the guard as he had put it in the morning.  It was, indeed, foolishness
+and insolence on the part of Louvois, and the King had spoken truly of
+him.  The King was so wounded that he could not pardon him.  After
+Louvois's death, he related this incident to Pomponne, still annoyed at
+it, as I knew by means of the Abbe de Pomponne.
+
+After the return from Mons the dislike of the King for Louvois augmented
+to such an extent, that this minister, who was so presumptuous, and who
+thought himself so necessary, began to tremble.  The Marechale de
+Rochefort having gone with her daughter, Madame de Blansac, to dine with
+him at Meudon, he took them out for a ride in a little 'calache', which
+he himself drove.  They heard him repeatedly say to himself, musing
+profoundly, "Will he?  Will he be made to?  No--and yet--no, he will not
+dare."
+
+During this monologue Louvois was so absorbed that he was within an ace
+of driving them all into the water, and would have done so, had they not
+seized the reins, and cried out that he was going to drown them.  At
+their cries and movement, Louvois awoke as from a deep sleep, drew up,
+and turned, saying that, indeed, he was musing, and not thinking of the
+vehicle.
+
+I was at Versailles at that time, and happened to call upon Louvois about
+some business of my father's.
+
+The same day I met him after dinner as he was going to work with the
+King.  About four o'clock in the afternoon I learned that he had been
+taken rather unwell at Madame de Maintenon's, that the King had forced
+him to go home, that he had done so on foot, that some trifling remedy
+was administered to him there, and that during the operation of it he
+died!
+
+The surprise of all the Court may be imagined.  Although I was little
+more than fifteen years of age, I wished to see the countenance of the
+King after the occurrence of an event of this kind.  I went and waited
+for him, and followed him during all his promenade.  He appeared to me
+with his accustomed majesty, but had a nimble manner, as though he felt
+more free than usual.  I remarked that, instead of going to see his
+fountains, and diversifying his walk as usual, he did nothing but walk up
+and down by the balustrade of the orangery, whence he could see, in
+returning towards the chateau, the lodging in which Louvois had just
+died, and towards which he unceasingly looked.
+
+The name of Louvois was never afterwards pronounced; not a word was said
+upon this death so surprising, and so sudden, until the arrival of an
+officer, sent by the King of England from Saint-Germain, who came to the
+King upon this terrace, and paid him a compliment of condolence upon the
+loss he had received.
+
+"Monsieur," replied the King, in a tone and with a manner more than easy,
+"give my compliments and my thanks to the King and Queen of England, and
+say to them in my name, that my affairs and theirs will go on none the
+worse for what has happened."
+
+The officer made a bow and retired, astonishment painted upon his face,
+and expressed in all his bearing.  I anxiously observed all this, and
+also remarked, that all the principal people around the King looked at
+each other, but said no word.  The fact was, as I afterwards learned,
+that Louvois, when he died, was so deeply in disgrace, that the very next
+day he was to have been arrested and sent to the Bastille!  The King told
+Chamillart so, and Chamillart related it to me.  This explains, I fancy,
+the joy of the King at the death of his minister; for it saved him from
+executing the plan he had resolved on.
+
+The suddenness of the disease and death of Louvois caused much talk,
+especially when, on the opening of the body, it was discovered that he
+had been poisoned.  A servant was arrested on the charge; but before the
+trial took place he was liberated, at the express command of the King,
+and the whole affair was hushed up.  Five or six months afterwards Seron,
+private physician of Louvois, barricaded himself in his apartment at
+Versailles, and uttered dreadful cries.  People came but he refused to
+open; and as the door could not be forced, he went on shrieking all day,
+without succour, spiritual or temporal, saying at last that he had got
+what he deserved for what he had done to his master; that he was a wretch
+unworthy of help; and so he died despairing, in eight or ten hours,
+without having spoken of any ones or uttered a single name!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LXXVII
+
+It must not be imagined that in order to maintain her position Madame de
+Maintenon had need of no address.  Her reign, on the contrary, was only
+one continual intrigue; and that of the King a perpetual dupery.
+
+Her mornings, which she commenced very early, were occupied with obscure
+audiences for charitable or spiritual affairs.  Pretty often, at eight
+o'clock in the morning, or earlier, she went to some minister; the
+ministers of war, above all those of finance, were those with whom she
+had most business.
+
+Ordinarily as soon as she rose, she went to Saint-Cyr, dined in her
+apartment there alone, or with some favourite of the house, gave as few
+audiences as possible, ruled over the arrangements of the establishment,
+meddled with the affairs of convents, read and replied to letters,
+directed the affairs of the house, received information and letters from
+her spies, and returned to Versailles just as the King was ready to enter
+her rooms.  When older and more infirm, she would lie down in bed on
+arriving between seven and eight o'clock in the morning at Saint-Cyr, or
+take some remedy.
+
+Towards nine o'clock in the evening two waiting-women came to undress
+her.  Immediately afterwards, her maitre d'hotel, or a valet de chambre
+brought her her supper--soup, or something light.  As soon as she had
+finished her meal, her women put her to bed, and all this in the presence
+of the King and his minister, who did not cease working or speak lower.
+This done, ten o'clock had arrived; the curtains of Madame de Maintenon
+were drawn, and the King went to supper, after saying good night to her.
+
+When with the King in her own room, they each occupied an armchair, with
+a table between them, at either side of the fireplace, hers towards the
+bed, the King's with the back to the wall, where was the door of the
+ante-chamber; two stools were before the table, one for the minister who
+came to work, the other for his papers.
+
+During the work Madame de Maintenon read or worked at tapestry.  She
+heard all that passed between the King and his minister, for they spoke
+out loud.  Rarely did she say anything, or, if so, it was of no moment.
+The King often asked her opinion; then she replied with great discretion.
+Never did she appear to lay stress on anything, still less to interest
+herself for anybody, but she had an understanding with the minister, who
+did not dare to oppose her in private, still less to trip in her
+presence.  When some favour or some post was to be granted, the matter
+was arranged between them beforehand; and this it was that sometimes
+delayed her, without the King or anybody knowing the cause.
+
+She would send word to the minister that she wished to speak to him.  He
+did not dare to bring anything forward until he had received her orders;
+until the revolving mechanism of each day had given them the leisure to
+confer together.  That done, the minister proposed and showed a list.  If
+by chance the King stopped at the name Madame de Maintenon wished, the
+minister stopped too, and went no further.  If the King stopped at some
+other, the minister proposed that he should look at those which were also
+fitting, allowed the King leisure to make his observations, and profited
+by them, to exclude the people who were not wanted.  Rarely did he
+propose expressly the name to which he wished to come, but always
+suggested several that he tried to balance against each other, so as to
+embarrass the King in his choice.  Then the King asked his opinion, and
+the minister, after touching upon other names, fixed upon the one he had
+selected.
+
+The King nearly always hesitated, and asked Madame de Maintenon what she
+thought.  She smiled, shammed incapacity, said a word upon some other
+name, then returned, if she had not fixed herself there at first, to that
+which the minister had proposed; so that three-fourths of the favours and
+opportunities which passed through the hands of the ministers in her
+rooms--and three-fourths even of the remaining fourth-were disposed of by
+her.  Sometimes when she had nobody for whom she cared, it was the
+minister, with her consent and her help, who decided, without the King
+having the least suspicion.  He thought he disposed of everything by
+himself; whilst, in fact, he disposed only of the smallest part, and
+always then by chance, except on the rare occasions when he specially
+wished to favour some one.
+
+As for state matters, if Madame de Maintenon wished to make them succeed,
+fail, or turn in some particular fashion (which happened much less often
+than where favours and appointments were in the wind), the same
+intelligence and the same intrigue were carried on between herself and
+the minister.  By these particulars it will be seen that this clever
+woman did nearly all she wished, but not when or how she wished.
+
+There was another scheme if the King stood out; it was to avoid decision
+by confusing and spinning out the matter in hand, or by substituting
+another as though arising, opportunely out of it, and by which it was
+turned aside, or by proposing that some explanations should be obtained.
+The first ideas of the King were thus weakened, and the charge was
+afterwards returned to, with the same address, oftentimes with success.
+
+It is this which made the ministers so necessary to Madame de Maintenon,
+and her so necessary to them: She rendered them, in fact, continual
+services by means of the King, in return for the services they rendered
+her.  The mutual concerns, therefore, between her and them were infinite;
+the King, all the while, not having the slightest suspicion of what was
+going on!
+
+The power of Madame de Maintenon was, as may be imagined, immense.  She
+had everybody in her hands, from the highest and most favoured minister
+to the meanest subject of the realm.  Many people have been ruined by
+her, without having been able to discover the author of their ruin,
+search as they might.  All attempts to find a remedy were equally
+unsuccessful.
+
+Yet the King was constantly on his guard, not only against Madame de
+Maintenon, but against his ministers also.  Many a time it happened that
+when sufficient care had not been taken, and he perceived that a minister
+or a general wished to favour a relative or protege of Madame de
+Maintenon, he firmly opposed the appointment on that account alone, and
+the remarks he uttered thereupon made Madame de Maintenon very timid and
+very measured when she wished openly to ask a favour.
+
+Le Tellier, long before he was made Chancellor, well knew the mood of the
+King.  One of his friends asked him for some place that he much desired.
+Le Tellier replied that he would do what he could.  The friend did not
+like this reply, and frankly said that it was not such as he expected
+from a man with such authority.  "You do not know the ground," replied Le
+Tellier; "of twenty matters that we bring before the King, we are sure he
+will pass nineteen according to our wishes; we are equally certain that
+the twentieth will be decided against them.  But which of the twenty will
+be decided contrary to our desire we never know, although it may be the
+one we have most at heart.  The King reserves to himself this caprice, to
+make us feel that he is the master, and that he governs; and if, by
+chance, something is presented upon which he is obstinate, and which is
+sufficiently important for us to be obstinate about also, either on
+account of the thing itself, or for the desire we have that it should
+succeed as we wish, we very often get a dressing; but, in truth, the
+dressing over, and the affair fallen through, the King, content with
+having showed that we can do nothing, and pained by having vexed us,
+becomes afterwards supple and flexible, so that then is the time at which
+we can do all we wish."
+
+This is, in truth, how the King conducted himself with his ministers,
+always completely governed by them, even by the youngest and most
+mediocre, even by the least accredited and the least respected--yet
+always on his guard against being governed, and always persuaded that he
+succeeded fully in avoiding it.
+
+He adopted the same conduct towards Madame de Maintenon, whom at times he
+scolded terribly, and applauded himself for so doing.  Sometimes she
+threw herself on her knees before him, and for several days was really
+upon thorns.  When she had appointed Fagon physician of the King in place
+of Daquin, whom she dismissed, she had a doctor upon whom she could
+certainly rely, and she played the sick woman accordingly, after those
+scenes with the King, and in this manner turned them to her own
+advantage.
+
+It was not that this artifice had any power in constraining the King, or
+that a real illness would have had any.  He was a man solely personal,
+and who counted others only as they stood in relation to himself.  His
+hard-heartedness, therefore, was extreme.  At the time when he was most
+inclined towards his mistresses, whatever indisposition they might labour
+under, even the most opposed to travelling and to appearing in full court
+dress, could not save them from either.  When enceinte, or ill, or just
+risen from child birth, they must needs be squeezed into full dress, go
+to Flanders or further, dance; sit up, attend fetes, eat, be merry and
+good company; go from place to place; appear neither to fear, nor to be
+inconvenienced by heat, cold, wind, or dust; and all this precisely to
+the hour and day, without a minute's grace.
+
+His daughters he treated in the same manner.  It has been seen, in its
+place, that he had no more consideration for Madame la Duchesse de Berry,
+nor even for Madame la Duchesse de Bourgogne--whatever Fagon, Madame de
+Maintenon, and others might do or say.  Yet he loved Madame la Duchesse
+de Bourgogne as tenderly as he was capable of loving anybody: but both
+she and Madame la Duchesse de Berry had miscarriages, which relieved him,
+he said, though they then had no children.
+
+When he travelled, his coach was always full of women; his mistresses,
+afterwards his bastards, his daughters-in-law, sometimes Madame, and
+other ladies when there was room.  In the coach, during his journeys,
+there were always all sorts of things to eat, as meat, pastry, fruit.
+A quarter of a league was not passed over before the King asked if
+somebody would not eat.  He never ate anything between meals himself,
+not even fruit; but he amused himself by seeing others do so, aye,
+and to bursting.  You were obliged to be hungry, merry, and to eat with
+appetite, otherwise he was displeased, and even showed it.  And yet after
+this, if you supped with him at table the same day, you were compelled to
+eat with as good a countenance as though you had tasted nothing since the
+previous night.  He was as inconsiderate in other and more delicate
+matters; and ladies, in his long drives and stations, had often occasion
+to curse him.  The Duchesse de Chevreuse once rode all the, way from
+Versailles to Fontainebleau in such extremity, that several times she was
+well-nigh losing consciousness.
+
+The King, who was fond of air, liked all the windows to be lowered;
+he would have been much displeased had any lady drawn a curtain for
+protection against sun, wind, or cold.  No inconvenience or incommodity
+was allowed to be even perceived; and the King always went very quickly,
+most frequently with relays.  To faint was a fault past hope of pardon.
+
+Madame de Maintenon, who feared the air and many other inconveniences,
+could gain no privilege over the others.  All she obtained, under
+pretence of modesty and other reasons, was permission to journey apart;
+but whatever condition she might be in, she was obliged to follow the
+King, and be ready to receive him in her rooms by the time he was ready
+to enter them.  She made many journeys to Marly in a state such as would
+have saved a servant from movement.  She made one to Fontainebleau when
+it seemed not unlikely that she would die on the road!  In whatever
+condition she might be, the King went to her at his ordinary hour and did
+what he had projected; though several times she was in bed, profusely
+sweating away a fever.  The King, who as I have said, was fond of air,
+and feared warm rooms, was astonished upon arriving to find everything
+close shut, and ordered the windows to be opened; would not spare them an
+inch; and up to ten o'clock, when he went to supper, kept them open,
+utterly regardless of the cool night air, although he knew well what a
+state she was in.  If there was to be music, fever or headache availed
+not; a hundred wax candles flashed all the same in her eyes.  The King,
+in fact, always followed his own inclination, without ever asking whether
+she was inconvenienced.
+
+The tranquillity and pious resignation of the King during the last days
+of his illness, was a matter of some surprise to many people, as, indeed,
+it deserved to be.  By way of explanation, the doctors said that the
+malady he died of, while it deadens and destroys all bodily pain, calms
+and annihilates all heart pangs and agitation of the mind.
+
+They who were in the sick-chamber, during the last days of his illness,
+gave another reason.
+
+The Jesuits constantly admit the laity, even married, into their company.
+This fact is certain.  There is no doubt that Des Noyers, Secretary of
+State under Louis XIII., was of this number, or that many others have
+been so too.  These licentiates make the same vow as the Jesuits, as far
+as their condition admits: that is, unrestricted obedience to the
+General, and to the superiors of the company.  They are obliged to supply
+the place of the vows of poverty and chastity, by promising to give all
+the service and all the protection in their power to the Company, above
+all, to be entirely submissive to the superiors and to their confessor.
+They are obliged to perform, with exactitude, such light exercises of
+piety as their confessor may think adapted to the circumstances of their
+lives, and that he simplifies as much as he likes.  It answers the
+purpose of the Company to ensure to itself those hidden auxiliaries whom
+it lets off cheaply.  But nothing must pass through their minds, nothing
+must come to their knowledge that they do not reveal to their confessor;
+and that which is not a secret of the conscience, to the superiors, if
+the confessor thinks fit.  In everything, too, they must obey without
+comment, the superior and the confessors.
+
+It has been pretended that Pere Tellier had inspired the King, long
+before his death, with the desire to be admitted, on this footing, into
+the Company; that he had vaunted to him the privileges and plenary
+indulgences attached to it; that he had persuaded him that whatever
+crimes had been committed, and whatever difficulty there might be in
+making amends for them, this secret profession washed out all, and
+infallibly assured salvation, provided that the vows were faithfully
+kept; that the General of the Company was admitted into the secret with
+the consent of the King; that the King pronounced the vows before Pere
+Tellier; that in the last days of his life they were heard, the one
+fortifying, the other resposing upon these promises; that, at last,
+the King received from Pere Tellier the final benediction of the Company,
+as one of its members; that Pere Tellier made the King offer up prayers,
+partly heard, of a kind to leave no doubt of the matter; and that he had
+given him the robe, or the almost imperceptible sign, as it were, a sort
+of scapulary, which was found upon him.  To conclude, the majority of
+those who approached the King in his last moments attributed his
+penitence to the artifices and persuasions of the Jesuits, who, for
+temporal interests, deceive sinners even up to the edge of the tomb, and
+conduct them to it in profound peace by a path strewn with flowers.
+
+However it is but fair to say, that Marechal, who was very trustful,
+assured me he had never perceived anything which justified this idea, and
+that he was persuaded there was not the least truth in it; and I think,
+that although he was not always in the chamber or near the bed, and
+although Pere Tellier might mistrust and try to deceive him, still if the
+King had been made a Jesuit as stated, Marechal must have had sore
+knowledge or some suspicion of the circumstance.
+
+
+
+
+ETEXT EDITOR'S BOOKMARKS:
+
+Depopulated a quarter of the realm
+He liked nobody to be in any way superior to him
+He was born bored; he was so accustomed to live out of himself
+He was scarcely taught how to read or write
+It is a sign that I have touched the sore point
+Pope not been ashamed to extol the Saint-Bartholomew
+Revocation of the edict of Nantes
+Seeing him eat olives with a fork!
+Touched, but like a man who does not wish to seem so
+Unreasonable love of admiration, was his ruin
+Who counted others only as they stood in relation to himself
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Memoirs of Louis XIV., Volume 10
+by Duc de Saint-Simon
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+The Project Gutenberg Memoirs Louis XIV., His Court and The Regency, v10
+#10 in our series by The Duc de Saint-Simon
+#32 in our series Historic Court Memoirs
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+Title: The Memoirs of Louis XIV., His Court and The Regency, v10
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+
+          MEMOIRS OF LOUIS XIV AND HIS COURT AND OF THE REGENCY
+
+                        BY THE DUKE OF SAINT-SIMON
+
+
+                                VOLUME 10.
+
+CHAPTER LXX
+
+Character and Position of the Duc d'Orleans--His Manners, Talents, and
+Virtues.--His Weakness.--Anecdote Illustrative Thereof.--
+The "Debonnaire"--Adventure of the Grand Prieur in England.--Education
+of the Duc d'Orleans.--Character of Dubois.--His Pernicious Influence.--
+The Duke's Emptiness.--His Deceit.--His Love of Painting.--The Fairies at
+His Birth.--The Duke's Timidity.--An Instance of His Mistrustfulness.
+
+
+CHAPTER LXXI
+
+The Duke Tries to Raise the Devil.--Magical Experiments.--His Religious
+Opinions.--Impiety.--Reads Rabelais at Church.--The Duchesse d'Orleans.--
+Her Character.--Her Life with Her Husband.--My Discourses with the Duke
+on the Future.--My Plans of Government.--A Place at Choice Offered Me.--
+I Decline the Honour.--My Reason.--National Bankruptcy.--The Duke's Anger
+at My Refusal.--A Final Decision.
+
+
+CHAPTER LXXII
+
+The King's Health Declines.--Bets about His Death.--Lord Stair.--My New
+Friend.--The King's Last Hunt.--And Last Domestic and Public Acts.--
+Doctors.--Opium.--The King's Diet.--Failure of His Strength.--His Hopes
+of Recovery.--Increased Danger.--Codicil to His Will.--Interview with the
+Duc d'Orleans.--With the Cardinal de Noailles.--Address to His
+Attendants.--The Dauphin Brought to Him.--His Last Words.--
+An Extraordinary Physician.--The Courtiers and the Duc d'Orleans.--
+Conduct of Madame de Maintenon.--The King's Death.
+
+
+CHAPTER LXXIII
+
+Early Life of Louis XIV.--His Education.--His Enormous Vanity.--His
+Ignorance.--Cause of the War with Holland.--His Mistakes and Weakness in
+War.--The Ruin of France.--Origin of Versailles.--The King's Love of
+Adulation, and Jealousy of People Who Came Not to Court.--His Spies.--
+His Vindictiveness.--Opening of Letters.--Confidence Sometimes Placed in
+Him--A Lady in a Predicament.
+
+
+CHAPTER LXXIV
+
+Excessive Politeness.--Influence of the Valets.--How the  King Drove
+Out.--Love of magnificence.--His Buildings. --Versailles.--The Supply of
+Water.--The King Seeks for Quiet.--Creation of Marly.--Tremendous
+Extravagance.
+
+
+CHAPTER LXXV
+
+Amours of the King.--La Valliere.--Montespan.--Scandalous Publicity.--
+Temper of Madame de Montespan.--Her Unbearable Haughtiness.--Other
+Mistresses.--Madame de Maintenon.--Her Fortunes.--Her Marriage with
+Scarron.--His Character and Society.--How She Lived After His Death.--
+Gets into Better Company.--Acquaintance with Madame de Montespan.--
+The King's Children.--His Dislike of Widow Scarron.--Purchase of the
+Maintenon Estate.--Further Demands.--M. du Maine on His Travels.--
+Montespan's Ill--humour.--Madame de Maintenon Supplants Her.--Her Bitter
+Annoyance.--Progress of the New Intrigue.--Marriage of the King and
+Madame de Maintenon.
+
+
+CHAPTER LXXVI
+
+Character of Madame de Maintenon.--Her Conversation.--Her Narrow-
+mindedness.--Her Devotion.--Revocation of the Edict of Nantes.--Its Fatal
+Consequences.--Saint Cyr.--Madame de Maintenon Desires Her Marriage to be
+Declared.--Her Schemes.--Counterworked by Louvois.--His Vigorous Conduct
+and Sudden Death.--Behaviour of the King.--Extraordinary Death of Seron.
+
+
+CHAPTER LXXVII
+
+Daily Occupations of Madame de Maintenon.--Her Policy--How She Governed
+the King's Affairs.--Connivance with the Ministers.--Anecdote of
+Le Tellier.--Behaviour of the King to Madame de Maintenon.--
+His Hardness.--Selfishness.--Want of Thought for Others.--Anecdotes.--
+Resignation of the King.--Its Causes.--The Jesuits and the Doctors.--The
+King and Lay Jesuits.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LXX
+
+The reign of Louis XIV. was approaching its conclusion, so that there is
+now nothing more to relate but what passed during the last month of his
+life, and scarcely so much.  These events, indeed, so curious and so
+important, are so mixed up with those that immediately followed the
+King's death, that they cannot be separated from them.  It will be
+interesting and is necessary to describe the projects, the thoughts, the
+difficulties, the different resolutions, which occupied the brain of the
+Prince, who, despite the efforts of Madame de Maintenon and M. du Maine,
+was of necessity about to be called to the head of affairs during the
+minority of the young King.  This is the place, therefore, to explain all
+these things, after which we will resume the narrative of the last month
+of the King's life, and go on to the events which followed his death.
+
+But, as I have said, before entering upon this thorny path, it will be as
+well to make known, if possible, the chief personage of the story, the
+impediments interior and exterior in his path, and all that personally
+belonged to him.
+
+M. le Duc d'Orleans was, at the most, of mediocre stature, full-bodied
+without being fat; his manner and his deportment were easy and very
+noble; his face was broad and very agreeable, high in colour; his hair
+black, and wig the same.  Although he danced very badly, and had but ill
+succeeded at the riding-school, he had in his face, in his gestures, in
+all his movements, infinite grace, and so natural that it adorned even
+his most ordinary commonplace actions.  With much ease when nothing
+constrained him, he was gentle, affable, open, of facile and charming
+access; the tone of his voice was agreeable, and he had a surprisingly
+easy flow of words upon all subjects which nothing ever disturbed, and
+which never failed to surprise; his eloquence was natural and extended
+even to his most familiar discourse, while it equally entered into his
+observations upon the most abstract sciences, on which he talked most
+perspicuously; the affairs of government, politics, finance, justice,
+war, the court, ordinary conversation, the arts, and mechanics.  He could
+speak as well too upon history and memoirs, and was well acquainted with
+pedigrees.  The personages of former days were familiar to him; and the
+intrigues of the ancient courts were to him as those of his own time.
+To hear him, you would have thought him a great reader.  Not so.  He
+skimmed; but his memory was so singular that he never forgot things,
+names, or dates, cherishing remembrance of things with precision; and his
+apprehension was so good, that in skimming thus it was, with him,
+precisely as though he had read very laboriously.  He excelled in
+unpremeditated discourse, which, whether in the shape of repartee or
+jest, was always appropriate and vivacious.  He often reproached me, and
+others more than he, with "not spoiling him;" but I often gave him praise
+merited by few, and which belonged to nobody so justly as to him; it was,
+that besides having infinite ability and of various kinds, the singular
+perspicuity of his mind was joined to so much exactness, that he would
+never have made a mistake in anything if he had allowed the first
+suggestions of his judgment.  He oftentimes took this my eulogy as a
+reproach, and he was not always wrong, but it was not the less true.
+With all this he had no presumption, no trace of superiority natural or
+acquired; he reasoned with you as with his equal, and struck the most
+able with surprise.  Although he never forgot his own position, nor
+allowed others to forget it, he carried no constraint with him, but put
+everybody at his ease, and placed himself upon the level of all others.
+
+He had the weakness to believe that he resembled Henry IV.  in
+everything, and strove to affect the manners, the gestures, the bearing,
+of that monarch.  Like Henry IV.  he was naturally good, humane,
+compassionate; and, indeed, this man, who has been so cruelly accused of
+the blackest and most inhuman crimes, was more opposed to the destruction
+of others than any one I have ever known, and had such a singular dislike
+to causing anybody pain that it may be said, his gentleness, his
+humanity, his easiness, had become faults; and I do not hesitate to
+affirm that that supreme virtue which teaches us to pardon our enemies he
+turned into vice, by the indiscriminate prodigality with which he applied
+it; thereby causing himself many sad embarrassments and misfortunes,
+examples and proofs of which will be seen in the sequel.
+
+I remember that about a year, perhaps, before the death of the King,
+having gone up early after dinner into the apartments of Madame la
+Duchesse d'Orleans at Marly, I found her in bed with the megrims,
+and M. d'Orleans alone in the room, seated in an armchair at her pillow.
+Scarcely had I sat down than Madame la Duchesse began to talk of some of
+those execrable imputations concerning M. d'Orleans unceasingly
+circulated by Madame de Maintenon and M. du Maine; and of an incident
+arising therefrom, in which the Prince and the Cardinal de Rohan had
+played a part against M. d'Orleans.  I sympathised with her all the more
+because the Duke, I knew not why, had always distinguished and courted
+those two brothers, and thought he could count upon them.  "And what will
+you say of M. d'Orleans," added the Duchesse, "when I tell you that since
+he has known this, known it beyond doubt, he treats them exactly the same
+as before?"
+
+I looked at M. d'Orleans, who had uttered only a few words to confirm the
+story, as it was being told, and who was negligently lolling in his
+chair, and I said to him with warmth:
+
+"Oh, as to that, Monsieur, the truth must be told; since Louis the
+Debonnaire, never has there been such a Debonnaire as you."
+
+At these words he rose in his chair, red with anger to the very whites of
+his eyes, and blurted out his vexation against me for abusing him, as he
+pretended, and against Madame la Duchesse d'Orleans for encouraging me
+and laughing at him.
+
+"Go on," said I, "treat your enemies well, and rail at your friends.  I
+am delighted to see you angry.  It is a sign that I have touched the sore
+point, when you press the finger on it the patient cries.  I should like
+to squeeze out all the matter, and after that you would be quite another
+man, and differently esteemed."
+
+He grumbled a little more, and then calmed down.  This was one of two
+occasions only, on which he was ever really angry with me.
+
+Two or three years after the death of the King, I was chatting in one of
+the grand rooms of the Tuileries, where the Council of the Regency was,
+according to custom, soon to be held, and M. d'Orleans at the other end
+was talking to some one in a window recess.  I heard myself called from
+mouth to mouth, and was told that M. d'Orleans wished to speak to me.
+This often happened before the Council.  I went therefore to the window
+where he was standing.  I found a serious bearing, a concentrated manner,
+an angry face, and was much surprised.
+
+"Monsieur," said he to me at once, "I have a serious complaint against
+you; you, whom I have always regarded as my best of friends."
+
+"Against me!  Monsieur!" said I, still more surprised.  "What is the
+matter, then, may I ask?"
+
+"The matter!" he replied with a mien still more angry; "something you
+cannot deny; verses you have made against me."
+
+"I--verses!" was my reply.  "Why, who the devil has been telling you such
+nonsense?  You have been acquainted with me nearly forty years, and do
+you not know, that never in my life have I been able to make a single
+verse--much less verses?"
+
+"No, no, by Heaven," replied he, "you cannot deny these;" and forthwith
+he began to sing to me a street song in his praise, the chorus of which
+was: 'Our Regent is debonnaire, la la, he is debonnaire,' with a burst of
+laughter.
+
+"What!" said I, "you remember it still!" and smiling, I added also,
+"since you are revenged for it, remember it in good earnest."  He kept on
+laughing a long time before going to the Council, and could not hinder
+himself.  I have not been afraid to write this trifle, because it seems
+to me that it paints the man.
+
+M. d'Orleans loved liberty, and as much for others as for himself.  He
+extolled England to me one day on this account, as a country where there
+are no banishments, no lettres de cachet, and where the King may close
+the door of his palace to anybody, but can keep no one in prison; and
+thereupon related to me with enjoyment, that besides the Duchess of
+Portsmouth, Charles the Second had many subordinate mistresses; that the
+Grand Prieur, young and amiable in those days, driven out of France for
+some folly, had gone to England to pass his exile and had been well
+received by the King.  By way of thanks, he seduced one of those
+mistresses, by whom the King was then so smitten, that he sued for mercy,
+offered money to the Grand Prieur, and undertook to obtain his
+reconciliation in France.  The Grand Prieur held firm.  Charles
+prohibited him the palace.  He laughed at this, and went every day to the
+theatre, with his conquest, and placed himself opposite the King.  At
+last, Charles, not knowing what to do to deliver himself from his
+tormentor, begged our King to recall him, and this was done.  But the
+Grand Prieur said he was very comfortable in England and continued his
+game.  Charles, outraged, confided to the King (Louis XIV.) the state he
+was thrown into by the Grand Prieur, and obtained a command so absolute
+and so prompt, that his tormentor was afterwards obliged to go back into
+France.
+
+M. d'Orleans admired this; and I know not if he would not have wished to
+be the Grand Prieur.  He always related this story with delight.  Thus,
+of ambition for reigning or governing, he had none.  If he made a false
+move in Spain it was because he had been misdirected.  What he would have
+liked best would have been to command armies while war lasted, and divert
+himself the rest of the time without constraint to himself or to others.
+He was, in fact, very fit for this.  With much valour, he had also much
+foresight, judgment, coolness, and vast capacity.  It may be said that he
+was captain, engineer, and army purveyor; that he knew the strength of
+his troops, the names and the company of the officers, and the most
+distinguished of each corps; that he knew how to make himself adored, at
+the same time keeping up discipline, and could execute the most difficult
+things, while unprovided with everything.  Unfortunately there is another
+side of this picture, which it will be as well now to describe.
+
+M. d'Orleans, by disposition so adapted to become the honour and the
+master-piece of an education, was not fortunate in his teachers.  Saint-
+Laurent, to whom he was first confided, was, it is true, the man in all
+Europe best fitted to act as the instructor of kings, but he died before
+his pupil was beyond the birch, and the young Prince, as I have related,
+fell entirely into the hands of the Abbe Dubois.  This person has played
+such an important part in the state since the death of the King, that it
+is fit that he should be made known.  The Abbe Dubois was a little,
+pitiful, wizened, herring-gutted man, in a flaxen wig, with a weazel's
+face, brightened by some intellect.  In familiar terms, he was a regular
+scamp.  All the vices unceasingly fought within him for supremacy, so
+that a continual uproar filled his mind.  Avarice, debauchery, ambition;
+were his gods; perfidy, flattery, foot-licking his means of action;
+complete impiety was his repose; and he held the opinion as a great
+principle, that probity and honesty are chimeras, with which people deck
+themselves, but which have no existence.  In consequence, all means were
+good to him.  He excelled in low intrigues; he lived in them, and could
+not do without them; but they always had an aim, and he followed them
+with a patience terminated only by success, or by firm conviction that he
+could not reach what he aimed at, or unless, as he wandered thus in deep
+darkness, a glimmer of light came to him from some other cranny.  He
+passed thus his days in sapping and counter-sapping.  The most impudent
+deceit had become natural to him, and was concealed under an air that was
+simple, upright, sincere, often bashful.  He would have spoken with grace
+and forcibly, if, fearful of saying more than he wished, he had not
+accustomed himself to a fictitious hesitation, a stuttering--which
+disfigured his speech, and which, redoubled when important things were in
+question, became insupportable and sometimes unintelligible.  He had wit,
+learning, knowledge of the world; much desire to please and insinuate
+himself, but all was spoiled by an odour of falsehood which escaped in
+spite of him through every pore of his body--even in the midst of his
+gaiety, which made whoever beheld it sad.  Wicked besides, with
+reflection, both by nature and by argument, treacherous and ungrateful,
+expert in the blackest villainies, terribly brazen when detected; he
+desired everything, envied everything, and wished to seize everything.
+It was known afterwards, when he no longer could restrain himself, to
+what an extent he was selfish, debauched, inconsistent, ignorant of
+everything, passionate, headstrong, blasphemous and mad, and to what an
+extent he publicly despised his master, the state, and all the world,
+never hesitating to sacrifice everybody and everything to his credit, his
+power, his absolute authority, his greatness, his avarice, his fears, and
+his vengeance.
+
+Such was the sage to whom M. le Duc d'Orleans was confided in early
+youth!
+
+Such a good master did not lose his pains with his new disciple, in whom
+the excellent principles of Saint-Laurent had not had time to take deep
+root, whatever esteem and affection he may have preserved through life
+for that worthy man.  I will admit here, with bitterness, for everything
+should be sacrificed to the truth, that M. le Duc d'Orleans brought into
+the world a failing--let us call things by their names--a weakness, which
+unceasingly spoiled all his talents, and which were of marvellous use to
+his preceptor all his life.  Dubois led him into debauchery, made him
+despise all duty and all decency, and persuaded him that he had too much
+mind to be the dupe of religion, which he said was a politic invention to
+frighten ordinary, intellects, and keep the people in subjection.  He
+filled him too with his favourite principle, that probity in man and
+virtue in woman, are mere chimeras, without existence in anybody except a
+few poor slaves of early training.  This was the basis of the good
+ecclesiatic's doctrines, whence arose the license of falsehood, deceit,
+artifice, infidelity, perfidy; in a word, every villainy, every crime,
+was turned into policy, capacity, greatness, liberty and depth of
+intellect, enlightenment, good conduct, if it could be hidden, and if
+suspicions and common prejudices could be avoided.
+
+Unfortunately all conspired in M. d'Orleans to open his heart and his
+mind to this execrable poison: a fresh and early youth, much strength and
+health, joy at escaping from the yoke as well as vexation at his
+marriage, the wearisomeness produced by idleness, the impulse of his
+passions, the example of other young men, whose vanity and whose interest
+it was to make him live like them.  Thus he grew accustomed to
+debauchery, above all to the uproar of it, so that he could not do
+without it, and could only divert himself by dint of noise, tumult, and
+excess.  It is this which led him often into such strange and such
+scandalous debauches, and as he wished to surpass all his companions, to
+mix up with his parties of pleasure the most impious discourses, and as a
+precious refinement, to hold the most outrageous orgies on the most holy
+days, as he did several times during his Regency on Good Friday, by
+choice, and on other similar days.  The more debauched a man was, the
+more he esteemed him; and I have unceasingly seen him in admiration, that
+reached almost to veneration for the Grand Prieur,--because for forty
+years he had always gone to bed drunk, and had never ceased to keep
+mistresses in the most public manner, and to hold the most impious and
+irreligious discourses.  With these principles, and the conduct that
+resulted from them, it is not surprising that M. le Duc d'Orleans was
+false to such an extent, that he boasted of his falsehood, and plumed
+himself upon being the most skilful deceiver in the world.  He and Madame
+la Duchesse de Berry sometimes disputed which was the cleverer of the
+two; and this in public before M. le Duc de Berry, Madame de Saint-Simon,
+and others!
+
+M. le Duc d'Orleans, following out the traditions of the Palais Royal,
+had acquired the detestable taste and habit of embroiling people one with
+the other, so as to profit by their divisions.  This was one of his
+principal occupations during all the time he was at the head of affairs,
+and one that he liked the best; but which, as soon as discovered,
+rendered him odious, and caused him a thousand annoyances.  He was not
+wicked, far from it; but he could not quit the habits of impiety,
+debauchery, and deceit into which Dubois had led him.  A remarkable
+feature in his character is, that he was suspicious and full of
+confidence at the same time with reference to the very same people.
+
+It is surprising that with all his talents he was totally without honest
+resources for amusing himself.  He was born bored; and he was so
+accustomed to live out of himself, that it was insufferable to him to
+return, incapable as he was of trying even to occupy himself.  He could
+only live in the midst of the movement and torrent of business; at the
+head of an army for instance, or in the cares that arose out of the
+execution of campaign projects, or in the excitement and uproar of
+debauchery.  He began to languish as soon as he was without noise,
+excess, and tumult, the time painfully hanging upon his hands.  He cast
+himself upon painting, when his great fancy for chemistry had passed or
+grown deadened, in consequence of what had been said upon it.  He painted
+nearly all the afternoon at Versailles and at Marly.  He was a good judge
+of pictures, liked them, and made a collection, which in number and
+excellence was not surpassed by those of the Crown.  He amused himself
+afterwards in making composition stones and seals over charcoal, the
+fumes of which often drove me away; and the strongest perfumes, which he
+was fond of all his life, but from which I turned him because the King
+was very much afraid of them, and soon sniffed them.  In fact, never was
+man born with so many talents of all kinds, so much readiness and
+facility in making use of them, and yet never was man so idle, so given
+up to vacuity and weariness.  Thus Madame painted him very happily by an
+illustration from fairy tales, of which she was full.
+
+She said, that all the fairies had been invited to his birth; that all
+came, and that each gave him some talent, so that he had them all.  But,
+unfortunately, an old fairy, who had disappeared so many years ago that
+she was no longer remembered, had been omitted from the invitation lists.
+Piqued at this neglect, she came supported upon her little wand, just at
+the moment when all the rest had endowed the child with their gifts.
+More and more vexed, she revenged herself by rendering useless all the
+talents he had received from the other fairies, not one of which, though
+possessing them all, in consequence of her malediction, was he able to
+make use of.  It must be admitted, that on the whole this is a speaking
+portrait.
+
+One of the misfortunes of this Prince was being incapable of following up
+anything, and an inability to comprehend, even, how any one else could do
+so.  Another, was a sort of insensibility which rendered him indifferent
+to the most mortal and the most dangerous offences; and as the nerve and
+principle of hatred and friendship, of gratitude and vengeance, are the
+same, and as they were wanting in him, the consequences were infinite and
+pernicious.  He was timid to excess, knew it, and was so ashamed that he
+affected to be exactly the reverse, and plumed himself upon his daring.
+But the truth is, as was afterwards seen, nothing could be obtained from
+him, neither grace, nor justice, except by working upon his fears, to
+which he was very susceptible; or by extreme importunity.  He tried to
+put people off by words, then by promises, of which he was monstrously
+prodigal, but which he only kept when made to people who had good firm
+claws.  In this manner he broke so many engagements that the most
+positive became counted as nothing; and he promised moreover to so many
+different people, what could only be given to one, that he thus opened
+out a copious source of discredit to himself and caused much discontent.
+Nothing deceived or injured him more than the opinion he had formed, that
+he could deceive all the world.  He was no longer believed, even when he
+spoke with the best faith, and his facility much diminished the value of
+everything he did.  To conclude, the obscure, and for the most part
+blackguard company, which he ordinarily frequented in his debauches, and
+which he did not scruple publicly to call his roues, drove away all
+decent people, and did him infinite harm.
+
+His constant mistrust of everything and everybody was disgusting, above
+all when he was at the head of affairs.  The fault sprang from his
+timidity, which made him fear his most certain enemies, and treat them
+with more distinction than his friends; from his natural easiness, from a
+false imitation of Henry IV., in whom this quality was by no means the
+finest; and from the unfortunate opinion which he held, that probity was
+a sham.  He was, nevertheless, persuaded of my probity; and would often
+reproach me with it as a fault and prejudice of education which had
+cramped my mind and obscured my understanding, and he said as much of
+Madame de Saint-Simon, because he believed her virtuous.
+
+I had given him so many proofs of my attachment that he could not very
+well suspect me; and yet, this is what happened two or three years after
+the establishment of the Regency.  I give it as one of the most striking
+of the touches that paint his portrait.
+
+It was autumn.  M. d'Orleans had dismissed the councils for a fortnight.
+I profited by this to go and spend the time at La Ferme.  I had just
+passed an hour alone with the Duke, and had taken my leave of him and
+gone home, where in order to be in repose I had closed my door to
+everybody.  In about an hour at most, I was told that Biron, with a
+message from M. le Duc d'Orleans, was at the door, with orders to see me,
+and that he would not go away without.  I allowed Biron to enter, all the
+more surprised because I had just quitted M. le Duc d'Orleans, and
+eagerly asked him the news.  Biron was embarrassed, and in his turn asked
+where was the Marquis de Ruffec (my son).  At this my surprise increased,
+and I demanded what he meant.  Biron, more and more confused, admitted
+that M. le Duc d'Orleans wanted information on this point, and had sent
+him for it.  I replied, that my son was with his regiment at Besancon,
+lodging with M. de Levi, who commanded in Franche-Comte.
+
+"Oh," said Biron, "I know that very well; but have you any letter from
+him?"
+
+"What for?" I asked.
+
+"Because, frankly, since I must tell you all," said he, "M. le Duc
+d'Orleans wishes to see his handwriting."
+
+He added, that soon after I had quitted M. le Duc d'Orleans, whilst he
+was walking at Montmartre ma garden with his 'roues' and his harlots,
+some letters had been brought to him by a post-office clerk, to whom he
+had spoken in private; that afterwards he, Biron, had been called by the
+Duke, who showed him a letter from the Marquis de Ruffec to his master,
+dated "Madrid," and charged him, thereupon, with this present commission.
+
+At this recital I felt a mixture of anger and compassion, and I did not
+constrain myself with Biron.  I had no letters from my son, because I
+used to burn them, as I did all useless papers.  I charged Biron to say
+to M. le Duc d'Orleans a part of what I felt; that I had not the
+slightest acquaintance with anybody in Spain; that I begged him at once
+to despatch a courier there in order to satisfy himself that my son was
+at Besancon.
+
+Biron, shrugging his shoulders, said all that was very good, but that if
+I could find a letter from the Marquis de Ruffec it would be much better;
+adding, that if one turned up and I sent it to him, he would take care
+that it reached M. le Duc d'Orleans, at table, in spite of the privacy of
+his suppers.  I did not wish to return to the Palais Royal to make a
+scene there, and dismissed Biron.  Fortunately, Madame de Saint-Simon
+came in some time after.  I related to her this adventure.  She found the
+last letter of the Marquis de Ruffec, and we sent it to Biron.  It
+reached the table as he had promised.  M. le Duc d'Orleans seized it with
+eagerness.  The joke is that he did not know the handwriting.  Not only
+did he look at the letter, but he read it; and as he found it diverting,
+regaled his company with it; it became the topic of their discourse, and
+entirely removed his suspicions.  Upon my return from La Ferme, I found
+him ashamed of himself, and I rendered him still more so by what I said
+to him on the subject.
+
+I learnt afterwards that this Madrid letter, and others that followed,
+came from a sham Marquis de Ruffec, that is to say, from the son of one
+of Madame's porters, who passed himself off as my son.  He pretended that
+he had quarrelled with me, and wrote to Madame de Saint-Simon, begging
+her to intercede for him; and all this that his letters might be seen,
+and that he might reap substantial benefits from his imposture in the
+shape of money and consideration.  He was a well-made fellow, had much
+address and effrontery, knew the Court very well, and had taken care to
+learn all about our family, so as to speak within limits.  He was
+arrested at Bayonne, at the table of Dadoncourt, who commanded there, and
+who suddenly formed the resolution, suspecting him not to be a gentleman,
+upon seeing him eat olives with a fork!  When in gaol he confessed who he
+was.  He was not new at the trade and was confined some little time.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LXXI
+
+But to return to M. le Duc d'Orleans.
+
+His curiosity, joined to a false idea of firmness and courage, had early
+led him to try and raise the devil and make him speak.  He left nothing
+untried, even the wildest reading, to persuade himself there was no God;
+and yet believed meanwhile in the devil, and hoped to see him and
+converse with him!  This inconsistency is hard to understand, and yet is
+extremely common.  He worked with all sorts of obscure people; and above
+all with Mirepoix, sublieutenant of the Black Musketeers, to find out
+Satan.  They passed whole nights in the quarries of Vanvres and of
+Vaugirard uttering invocations.  M. le Duc d'Orleans, however, admitted
+to me that he had never succeeded in hearing or seeing anything, and at
+last had given up this folly.
+
+At first it was only to please Madame d'Argenton, but afterwards from
+curiosity, that he tried to see the present and the future in a glass of
+water; so he said, and he was no liar.  To be false and to be a liar are
+not one and the same thing, though they closely resemble each other, and
+if he told a lie it was only when hard pressed upon some promise or some
+business, and in spite of himself, so as to escape from a dilemma.
+
+Although we often spoke upon religion, to which I tried to lead him so
+long as I had hope of success, I never could unravel the system he had
+formed for himself, and I ended by becoming persuaded that he wavered
+unceasingly without forming any religion at all.
+
+His passionate desire, like that of his companions in morals, was this,
+that it would turn out that there is no God; but he had too much
+enlightenment to be an atheist; who is a particular kind of fool much
+more rare than is thought.  This enlightenment importuned him; he tried
+to extinguish it and could not.  A mortal soul would have been to him a
+resource; but he could not convince himself of its existence.  A God and
+an immortal soul, threw him into sad straits, and yet he could not blind
+himself to the truth of both the one and the other.  I can say then this,
+I know of what religion he was not; nothing more.  I am sure, however,
+that he was very ill at ease upon this point, and that if a dangerous
+illness had overtaken him, and he had had the time, he would have thrown
+himself into the hands of all the priests and all the Capuchins of the
+town.  His great foible was to pride himself upon his impiety and to wish
+to surpass in that everybody else.
+
+I recollect that one Christmas-time, at Versailles, when he accompanied
+the King to morning prayers and to the three midnight masses, he
+surprised the Court by his continued application in reading a volume he
+had brought with him, and which appeared to be, a prayer book.  The chief
+femme de chambre of Madame la Duchesse d'Orleans, much attached to the
+family, and very free as all good old domestics are, transfixed with joy
+at M. le Duc d'Orleans's application to his book, complimented him upon
+it the next day, in the presence of others.  M. le Duc d'Orleans allowed
+her to go on some time, and then said, "You are very silly, Madame
+Imbert.  Do you know what I was reading?  It was 'Rabelais,' that I
+brought with me for fear of being bored."
+
+The effect of this reply may be imagined.  The thing was too true, and
+was pure braggadocio; for, without comparison of the places, or of the
+things, the music of the chapel was much superior to that of the opera,
+and to all the music of Europe; and at Christmas it surpassed itself.
+There was nothing so magnificent as the decoration of the chapel, or the
+manner in which it was lighted.  It was full of people; the arches of the
+tribune were crowded with the Court ladies, in undress, but ready for
+conquest.  There was nothing so surprising as the beauty of the
+spectacle.  The ears were charmed also.  M. le Duc d'Orleans loved music
+extremely; he could compose, and had amused himself by composing a kind
+of little opera, La Fare writing the words, which was performed before
+the King.  This music of the chapel, therefore, might well have occupied
+him in the most agreeable manner, to say nothing of the brilliant scene,
+without his having recourse to Rabelais.  But he must needs play the
+impious, and the wag.
+
+Madame la Duchesse d'Orleans was another kind of person.  She was tall,
+and in every way majestic; her complexion, her throat, her arms, were
+admirable; she had a tolerable mouth, with beautiful teeth, somewhat
+long; and cheeks too broad, and too hanging, which interfered with, but
+did not spoil, her beauty.  What disfigured her most was her eyebrows,
+which were, as it were, peeled and red, with very little hair; she had,
+however, fine eyelashes, and well-set chestnut-coloured hair.  Without
+being hump-backed or deformed, she had one side larger than the other,
+and walked awry.  This defect in her figure indicated another, which was
+more troublesome in society, and which inconvenienced herself.  She had a
+good deal of intellect, and spoke with much ability.  She said all she
+wished, and often conveyed her meaning to you without directly expressing
+it; saying, as it were, what she did not say.  Her utterance was,
+however, slow and embarrassed, so that unaccustomed ears with difficulty
+followed her.
+
+Every kind of decency and decorum centred themselves in her, and the most
+exquisite pride was there upon its throne.  Astonishment will be felt at
+what I am going to say, and yet, however, nothing is more strictly true:
+it is, that at the bottom of her soul she believed that she, bastard of
+the King, had much honoured M. d'Orleans in marrying him!  M. le Duc
+d'Orleans often laughed at her pride, called her Madame Lucifer, in
+speaking to her, and she admitted that the name did not displease her.
+She always received his advances with coldness, and a sort of superiority
+of greatness.  She was a princess to the backbone, at all hours, and in
+all places.  Yet, at the same time, her timidity was extreme.  The King
+could have made her feel ill with a single severe look; and Madame de
+Maintenon could have done likewise, perhaps.  At all events, Madame la
+Duchesse d'Orleans trembled before her; and upon the most commonplace
+matters never replied to either him or her without hesitation, fear
+printed on her face.
+
+M. le Duc and Madame la Duchesse d'Orleans lived an idle, languishing,
+shameful, indecent, and despised life, abandoned by all the Court.  This,
+I felt, was one of the first things that must be remedied.  Accordingly,
+I induced Madame la Duchesse d'Orleans to make an effort to attract
+people to her table.  She did so, persevering against the coldness and
+aversion she met with, and in time succeeded in drawing a tolerably
+numerous company to her dinners.  They were of exquisite quality, and
+people soon got over their first hesitation, when they found everything
+orderly, free, and unobjectionable.  At these dinners, M. d'Orleans kept
+within bounds, not only in his discourse, but in his behaviour.  But
+oftentimes his ennui led him to Paris, to join in supper parties and
+debauchery.  Madame la Duchesse d'Orleans tried to draw him from these
+pleasures by arranging small parties at her pretty little villa, l'Etoile
+(in the park of Versailles), which the King had given to her, and which
+she had furnished in the most delightful manner.  She loved good cheer,
+the guests loved it also, and at table she was altogether another person
+--free, gay, exciting, charming.  M. le Duc d'Orleans cared for nothing
+but noise, and as he threw off all restraint at these parties, there was
+much difficulty in selecting guests, for the ears of many people would
+have been much confused at his loose talk, and their eyes much astonished
+to see him get drunk at the very commencement of the repast, in the midst
+of those who thought only of amusing and recreating themselves in a
+decent manner, and who never approached intoxication.
+
+As the King became weaker in health, and evidently drew near his end, I
+had continued interviews with Madame d'Orleans upon the subject of the
+Regency, the plan of government to be adopted, and the policy she should
+follow.  Hundreds of times before we had reasoned together upon the
+faults of the Government, and the misfortunes that resulted from them.
+What we had to do was to avoid those faults, educate the young King in
+good and rational maxims, so that when he succeeded to power he might
+continue what the Regency had not had time to finish.  This, at least,
+was my idea; and I laboured hard to make it the idea of M. le Duc
+d'Orleans.  As the health of the King diminished I entered more into
+details; as I will explain.
+
+What I considered the most important thing to be done, was to overthrow
+entirely the system of government in which Cardinal Mazarin had
+imprisoned the King and the realm.  A foreigner, risen from the dregs
+of the people, who thinks of nothing but his own power and his own
+greatness, cares nothing for the state, except in its relation to
+himself.  He despises its laws, its genius, its advantages: he is
+ignorant of its rules and its forms; he thinks only of subjugating all,
+of confounding all, of bringing all down to one level.  Richelieu and his
+successor, Mazarin, succeeded so well in this policy that the nobility,
+by degrees, became annihilated, as we now see them.  The pen and the robe
+people, on the other hand, were exalted; so that now things have reached
+such a pretty pass that the greatest lord is without power, and in a
+thousand different manners is dependent upon the meanest plebeian.  It is
+in this manner that things hasten from one extreme to the other.
+
+My design was to commence by introducing the nobility into the ministry,
+with the dignity and authority due to them, and by degrees to dismiss the
+pen and robe people from all employ not purely judicial.  In this manner
+the administration of public affairs would be entirely in the hands of
+the aristocracy.  I proposed to abolish the two offices of secretary of
+state for the war department, and for foreign affairs, and to supply
+their place by councils; also, that the offices of the navy should be
+managed by a council.  I insisted upon the distinct and perfect
+separation of these councils, so that their authority should never be
+confounded, and the public should never have the slightest trouble in
+finding out where to address itself for any kind of business.
+
+M. le Duc d'Orleans exceedingly relished my project, which we much
+discussed.  This point arrived at, it became necessary to debate upon the
+persons who were to form these councils.  I suggested names, which were
+accepted or set aside, according as they met his approval or
+disapprobation.  "But," said M. le Duc d'Orleans, after we had been a
+long time at this work, "you propose everybody and never say a word of
+yourself.  What do you wish to be?"
+
+I replied, that it was not for me to propose, still less to choose any
+office, but for him to see if he wished to employ me, believing me
+capable, and in that case to determine the place he wished me to occupy.
+This was at Marly, in his chamber, and I shall never forget it.
+
+After some little debate, that between equals would have been called
+complimentary, he proposed to me the Presidency of the Council of
+Finance.  But I had good reasons for shrinking from this office.  I saw
+that disordered as the finances had become there was only one remedy by
+which improvement could be effected; and this was National Bankruptcy.
+Had I occupied the office, I should have been too strongly tempted to
+urge this view, and carry it out, but it was a responsibility I did not
+wish to take upon myself before God and man.  Yet, I felt as I said, that
+to declare the State bankrupt would be the wisest course, and I am bold
+enough to think, that there is not a man, having no personal interest in
+the continuance of imposts, who of two evils, viz., vastly increased
+taxation, and national failure, would not prefer the latter.  We were in
+the condition of a man who unfortunately must choose between passing
+twelve or fifteen years in his bed, in continual pain, or having his leg
+cut off.  Who can doubt this?  he would prefer the loss of his leg by a
+painful operation, in order to find himself two months after quite well,
+free from suffering and in the enjoyment of all his faculties.
+
+I shrunk accordingly from the finances for the reason I have above given,
+and made M. le Duc d'Orleans so angry by my refusal to accept the office
+he had proposed to me, that for three weeks he sulked and would not speak
+to me, except upon unimportant matters.
+
+At the end of that time, in the midst of a languishing conversation, he
+exclaimed, "Very well, then.  You stick to your text, you won't have the
+finances?"
+
+I respectfully lowered my eyes and replied, in a gentle tone, that I
+thought that question was settled.  He could not restrain some
+complaints, but they were not bitter, nor was he angry, and then rising
+and taking a few turns in the room, without saying a word, and his head
+bent, as was his custom when embarrassed, he suddenly spun round upon me,
+and exclaimed, "But whom shall we put there?"
+
+I suggested the Duc de Noailles, and although the suggestion at first met
+with much warm opposition from M. le Duc d'Orleans, it was ultimately
+accepted by him.
+
+The moment after we had settled this point he said to me, "And you! what
+will you be?" and he pressed me so much to explain myself that I said at
+last if he would put me in the council of affairs of the interior, I
+thought I should do better there than elsewhere.
+
+"Chief, then," replied he with vivacity.
+
+"No, no! not that," said I; "simply a place in the council."
+
+We both insisted, he for, I against.  "A place in that council," he said,
+"would be ridiculous, and cannot be thought of.  Since you will not be
+chief, there is only one post which suits you, and which suits me also.
+You must be in the council I shall be in the Supreme Council."
+
+I accepted the post, and thanked him.  From that moment this distinction
+remained fixed.
+
+I will not enter into all the suggestions I offered to M. le Duc
+d'Orleans respecting the Regency, or give the details of all the projects
+I submitted to him.  Many of those projects and suggestions were either
+acted upon only partially, or not acted upon at all, although nearly
+every one met with his approval.  But he was variable as the winds, and
+as difficult to hold.  In my dealings with him I had to do with a person
+very different from that estimable Dauphin who was so rudely taken away
+from us.
+
+But let me, before going further, describe the last days of the King, his
+illness, and death, adding to the narrative a review of his life and
+character.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LXXII
+
+LOUIS XIV. began, as I have before remarked, sensibly to decline, and
+his appetite, which had always been good and uniform, very considerably
+diminished.  Even foreign countries became aware of this.  Bets were laid
+in London that his life would not last beyond the first of September,
+that is to say, about three months, and although the King wished to know
+everything, it may be imagined that nobody was very eager to make him
+acquainted with the news.  He used to have the Dutch papers read to him
+in private by Torcy, often after the Council of State.  One day as Torcy
+was reading, coming unexpectedly--for he had not examined the paper--upon
+the account of these bets, he stopped, stammered, and skipped it.  The
+King, who easily perceived this, asked him the cause of his
+embarrassment; what he was passing over, and why?  Torcy blushed to the
+very whites of his eyes, and said it was a piece of impertinence unworthy
+of being read.  The King insisted; Torcy also: but at last thoroughly
+confused, he could not resist the reiterated command he received, and
+read the whole account of the bets.  The King pretended not to be touched
+by it, but he was, and profoundly, so that sitting down to table
+immediately afterwards, he could not keep himself from speaking of it,
+though without mentioning the gazette.
+
+This was at Marly, and by chance I was there that day.  The King looked
+at me as at the others, but as though asking for a reply.  I took good
+care not to open my mouth, and lowered my eyes.  Cheverny, (a discreet
+man,) too, was not so prudent, but made a long and ill-timed rhapsody
+upon similar reports that had come to Copenhagen from Vienna while he was
+ambassador at the former place seventeen or eighteen years before.  The
+King allowed him to say on, but did not take the bait.  He appeared
+touched, but like a man who does not wish to seem so.  It could be seen
+that he did all he could to eat, and to show that he ate with appetite.
+But it was also seen that the mouthfuls loitered on their way.  This
+trifle did not fail to augment the circumspection of the Court, above all
+of those who by their position had reason to be more attentive than the
+rest.  It was reported that an aide-decamp of Lord Stair, who was then
+English ambassador to our Court, and very much disliked for his insolent
+bearing and his troublesome ways, had caused these bets by what he had
+said in England respecting the health of the King.  Stair, when told
+this, was much grieved, and said 'twas a scoundrel he had dismissed.
+
+As the King sensibly declined I noticed that although terror of him kept
+people as much away from M. d'Orleans as ever, I was approached even by
+the most considerable.  I had often amused myself at the expense of these
+prompt friends; I did so now, and diverted M. d'Orleans by warning him
+beforehand what he had to expect.
+
+On Friday, the 9th of August, 1715, the King hunted the stag after dinner
+in his caleche, that he drove himself as usual.  'Twas for the last time.
+Upon his return he appeared much knocked up.  There was a grand concert
+in the evening in Madame de Maintenon's apartment.
+
+On Saturday, the 10th of August, he walked before dinner in his gardens
+at Marly; he returned to Versailles about six o'clock in the evening, and
+never again saw that strange work of his hands.  In the evening he worked
+with the Chancellor in Madame de Maintenon's rooms, and appeared to
+everybody very ill.  On Sunday, the eleventh of August, he held the
+Council of State, walked, after dinner to Trianon, never more to go out
+again during life.
+
+On the morrow, the 12th of August, he took medicine as usual, and lived
+as usual the following days.  It was known that he complained of sciatica
+in the leg and thigh.  He had never before had sciatica, or rheumatism,
+or a cold; and for a long time no touch of gout.  In the evening there
+was a little concert in Madame de Maintenon's rooms.  This was the last
+time in his life that he walked alone.
+
+On Tuesday, the 13th of August, he made a violent effort, and gave a
+farewell audience to a sham Persian ambassador, whom Pontchartrain had
+imposed upon him; this was the last public action of his life.  The
+audience, which was long, fatigued the King.  He resisted the desire for
+sleep which came over him, held the Finance Council, dined, had himself
+carried to Madame de Maintenon's, where a little concert was given, and
+on leaving his cabinet stopped for the Duchesse de la Rochefoucauld, who
+presented to him the Duchesse de la Rocheguyon, her daughter-in-law, who
+was the last lady presented to him.  She took her tabouret that evening
+at the King's grand supper, which was the last he ever gave.  On the
+morrow he sent some precious stones to the Persian ambassador just
+alluded to.  It was on this day that the Princesse des Ursins set off for
+Lyons, terrified at the state of the King as I have already related.
+
+For more than a year the health of the King had diminished.  His valets
+noticed this first, and followed the progress of the malady, without one
+of them daring to open his mouth.  The bastards, or to speak exactly, M,
+du Maine saw it; Madame de Maintenon also; but they did nothing.  Fagon,
+the chief physician, much fallen off in mind and body, was the only one
+of the King's intimates who saw nothing.  Marechal, also chief physician,
+spoke to him (Fagon) several times, but was always harshly repulsed.
+Pressed at last by his duty and his attachment, he made bold one morning
+towards Whitsuntide to go to Madame de Maintenon.  He told her what he
+saw and how grossly Fagon was mistaken.  He assured her that the, King,
+whose pulse he had often felt, had had for some time a slow internal
+fever; that his constitution was so good that with remedies and attention
+all would go well, but that if the malady were allowed to grow there
+would no longer be any resource.  Madame de Maintenon grew angry, and all
+he obtained for his zeal was her anger.  She said that only the personal
+enemies of Fagon could find fault with his opinion upon the King's
+health, concerning which the capacity, the application, the experience of
+the chief physician could not be deceived.  The best of it is that
+Marechal, who had formerly operated upon Fagon for stone, had been
+appointed chief surgeon by him, and they had always lived on the best of
+terms.  Marechal, annoyed as he related to me, could do nothing more, and
+began from that time to lament the death of his master.  Fagon was in
+fact the first physician in Europe, but for a long time his health had
+not permitted him to maintain his experience; and the high point of
+authority to which his capacity and his favour had carried him, had at
+last spoiled him.  He would not hear reason, or submit to reply, and
+continued to treat the King as he had treated him in early years; and
+killed him by his obstinacy.
+
+The gout of which the King had had long attacks, induced Fagon to swaddle
+him, so to say, every evening in a heap of feather pillows, which made
+him sweat all night to such an extent that it was necessary in the
+morning to rub him down and change his linen before the grand chamberlain
+and the first gentleman of the chamber could enter.  For many years he
+had drunk nothing but Burgundy wine, half mixed with water, and so old
+that it was used up instead of the best champagne which he had used all
+his life.  He would pleasantly say sometimes that foreign lords who were
+anxious to taste the wine he used, were often mightily deceived.  At no
+time had he ever drunk pure wine, or made use in any way of spirits, or
+even tea, coffee, or chocolate.  Upon rising, instead of a little bread
+and wine and water, he had taken for a long time two glasses of sage and
+veronica; often between his meals, and always on going to bed, glasses of
+water with a little orange-flower water in them, and always iced.  Even
+on the days when he had medicine he drank this, and always also at his
+meals, between which he never ate anything except some cinnamon lozenges
+that he put into his pocket at his dessert, with a good many cracknels
+for the bitches he kept in his cabinet.
+
+As during the last year of his life the King became more and more
+costive, Fagon made him eat at the commencement of his repasts many iced
+fruits, that is to say, mulberries, melons, and figs rotten from
+ripeness; and at his dessert many other fruits, finishing with a
+surprising quantity of sweetmeats.  All the year round he ate at supper a
+prodigious quantity of salad.  His soups, several of which he partook of
+morning and evening, were full of gravy, and were of exceeding strength,
+and everything that was served to him was full of spice, to double the
+usual extent, and very strong also.  This regimen and the sweetmeats
+together Fagon did not like, and sometimes while seeing the King eat, he
+would make most amusing grimaces, without daring however to say anything
+except now and then to Livry and Benoist, who replied that it was their
+business to feed the King, and his to doctor him.  The King never ate any
+kind of venison or water-fowl, but otherwise partook of everything, fete
+days and fast days alike, except that during the last twenty years of his
+life he observed some few days of Lent.
+
+This summer he redoubled his regime of fruits and drinks.  At last the
+former clogged his stomach, taken after soup, weakened the digestive
+organs and took away his appetite, which until then had never failed him
+all his life, though however late dinner might be delayed he never was
+hungry or wanted to eat.  But after the first spoonfuls of soup, his
+appetite came, as I have several times heard him say, and he ate so
+prodigiously and so solidly morning and evening that no one could get
+accustomed to see it.  So much water and so much fruit unconnected by
+anything spirituous, turned his blood into gangrene; while those forced
+night sweats diminished its strength and impoverished it; and thus his
+death was caused, as was seen by the opening of his body.  The organs
+were found in such good and healthy condition that there is reason to
+believe he would have lived beyond his hundredth year.  His stomach above
+all astonished, and also his bowels by their volume and extent, double
+that of the ordinary, whence it came that he was such a great yet uniform
+eater.  Remedies were not thought of until it was no longer time, because
+Fagon would never believe him ill, or Madame de Maintenon either; though
+at the same time she had taken good care to provide for her own retreat
+in the case of his death.  Amidst all this, the King felt his state
+before they felt it, and said so sometimes to his valets: Fagon always
+reassured him, but did nothing.  The King was contented with what was
+said to him without being persuaded: but his friendship for Fagon
+restrained him, and Madame de Maintenon still more.
+
+On Wednesday, the 14th of August, the King was carried to hear mass for
+the last time; held the Council of State, ate a meat dinner, and had
+music in Madame de Maintenon's rooms.  He supped in his chamber, where
+the Court saw him as at his dinner; was with his family a short time in
+his cabinet, and went to bed a little after ten.
+
+On Thursday, the Festival of the Assumption, he heard mass in his bed.
+The night had been disturbed and bad.  He dined in his bed, the courtiers
+being present, rose at five and was carried to Madame de Maintenon's,
+where music was played.  He supped and went to bed as on the previous
+evening.  As long as he could sit up he did the same.
+
+On Friday, the 16th of August, the night had been no better; much thirst
+and drink.  The King ordered no one to enter until ten.  Mass and dinner
+in his bed as before; then he was carried to Madame de Maintenon's; he
+played with the ladies there, and afterwards there was a grand concert.
+
+On Saturday, the 17th of August, the night as the preceding.  He held the
+Finance Council, he being in bed; saw people at his dinner, rose
+immediately after; gave audience in his cabinet to the General of the
+order of Sainte-Croix de la Bretonnerie; passed to Madame de Maintenon's,
+where he worked with the Chancellor.  At night, Fagon slept for the first
+time in his chamber.
+
+Sunday, the 18th of August, passed like the preceding days, Fagon
+pretended there had been no fever.  The King held a Council of State
+before and after his dinner; worked afterwards upon the fortifications
+with Pelletier; then passed to Madame de Maintenon's, where there was
+music.
+
+Monday, the 19th, and Tuesday, the 20th of August, passed much as the
+previous days, excepting that on the latter the King supped in his
+dressing-gown, seated in an armchair; and that after this evening he
+never left his room or dressed himself again.  That same day Madame de
+Saint-Simon, whom I had pressed to return, came back from the waters of
+Forges.  The king, entering after supper into his cabinet, perceived her.
+He ordered his chair to be stopped; spoke to her very kindly upon her
+journey and her return; then had himself wheeled on by Bloin into the
+other cabinet.  She was the last Court lady to whom he spoke.  I don't
+count those who were always near him, and who came to him when he could
+no longer leave his room.  Madame de Saint-Simon said to me in the
+evening that she should not have recognised the King if she had met him
+anywhere else.  Yet she had left Marly for Forges only on the 6th of
+July.
+
+On Wednesday, the 21st of August, four physicians saw the King, but took
+care to do nothing except praise Fagon, who gave him cassia.  For some
+days it had been perceived that he ate meat and even bread with
+difficulty, (though all his life he had eaten but little of the latter,
+and for some time only the crumb, because he had no teeth).  Soup in
+larger quantity, hash very light, and eggs compensated him; but he ate
+very sparingly.
+
+On Thursday, the 22nd of August, the King was still worse.  He saw four
+other physicians, who, like the first four, did nothing but admire the
+learned and admirable treatment of Fagon, who made him take towards
+evening some Jesuit bark and water and intended to give him at night,
+ass's milk.  This same day, the King ordered the Duc de la Rochefoucauld
+to bring him his clothes on the morrow, in order that he might choose
+which he would wear upon leaving off the mourning he wore for a son of
+Madame la Duchesse de Lorraine.  He had not been able to quit his chamber
+for some days; he could scarcely eat anything solid; his physician slept
+in his chamber, and yet he reckoned upon being cured, upon dressing
+himself again, and wished to choose his dress!  In like manner there was
+the same round of councils, of work, of amusements.  So true it is, that
+men do not wish to die, and dissimulate from themselves the approach of
+death as long as possible.  Meanwhile, let me say, that the state of the
+King, which nobody was ignorant of, had already changed M. d'Orleans'
+desert into a crowded city.
+
+Friday, the 23rd of August, the night was as usual, the morning also.
+The King worked with Pere Tellier, who tried, but in vain, to make him
+fill up several benefices that were vacant; that is to say, Pere Tellier
+wished to dispose of them himself, instead of leaving them to M. le Duc
+d'Orleans.  Let me state at once, that the feebler the King grew the more
+Pere Tellier worried him; so as not to lose such a rich prey, or miss the
+opportunity of securing fresh creatures for his service.  But he could
+not succeed.  The King declared to him that he had enough to render
+account of to God, without charging himself with this nomination, and
+forbade him to speak again upon the subject.
+
+On Saturday evening, the 24th of August, he supped in his dressing-gown,
+in presence of the courtiers, for the last time.  I noticed that he could
+only swallow liquids, and that he was troubled if looked at.  He could
+not finish his supper, and begged the courtiers to pass on, that is to
+say, go away.  He went to bed, where his leg, on which were several black
+marks, was examined.  It had grown worse lately and had given him much
+pain.  He sent for Pere Tellier and made confession.  Confusion spread
+among the doctors at this.  Milk, and Jesuit bark and water had been
+tried and abandoned in turns; now, nobody knew what to try.  The doctors
+admitted that they believed he had had a slow fever ever since
+Whitsuntide; and excused themselves for doing nothing on the ground that
+he did not wish for remedies.
+
+On Sunday, the 25th of August, no more mystery was made of the King's
+danger.  Nevertheless, he expressly commanded that nothing should be
+changed in the usual order of this day (the fete of St.  Louis), that is
+to say, that the drums and the hautboys, assembled beneath his windows,
+should play their accustomed music as soon as he awoke, and that the
+twenty-four violins should play in the ante-chamber during his dinner.
+He worked afterwards with the Chancellor, who wrote, under his dictation,
+a codicil to his will, Madame de Maintenon being present.  She and M. du
+Maine, who thought incessantly of themselves, did not consider the King
+had done enough for them by his will; they wished to remedy this by a
+codicil, which equally showed how enormously they abused the King's
+weakness in this extremity, and to what an excess ambition may carry us.
+By this codicil the King submitted all the civil and military household
+of the young King to the Duc du Maine, and under his orders to Marechal
+de Villeroy, who, by this disposition became the sole masters of the
+person and the dwelling place of the King, and of Paris, by the troops
+placed in their hands; so that the Regent had not the slightest shadow of
+authority and was at their mercy; certainly liable to be arrested or
+worse, any time it should please M. du Maine.
+
+Soon after the Chancellor left the King, Madame de Maintenon, who
+remained, sent for the ladies; and the musicians came at seven o'clock in
+the evening.  But the King fell asleep during the conversation of the
+ladies.  He awoke; his brain confused, which frightened them and made
+them call the doctors.  They found his pulse so bad that they did not
+hesitate to propose to him, his senses having returned, to take the
+sacrament without delay.  Pere Tellier was sent for; the musicians who
+had just prepared their books and their instruments, were dismissed, the
+ladies also; and in a quarter of an hour from that time, the King made
+confession to Pere Tellier, the Cardinal de Rohan, meanwhile, bringing
+the Holy Sacrament from the chapel, and sending for the Cure and holy
+oils.  Two of the King's chaplains, summoned by the Cardinal, came, and
+seven or eight candlesticks were carried by valets.  The Cardinal said a
+word or two to the King upon this great and last action, during which the
+King appeared very firm, but very penetrated with what he was doing.  As
+soon as he had received Our Saviour and the holy oils, everybody left the
+chamber except Madame de Maintenon and the Chancellor.  Immediately
+afterwards, and this was rather strange, a kind of book or little tablet
+was placed upon the bed, the codicil was presented to the King, and at
+the bottom of it he wrote four or five lines, and restored the document
+to the Chancellor.
+
+After this, the King sent for M. le Duc d'Orleans, showed him much
+esteem, friendship, and confidence; but what is terrible with Jesus
+Christ still upon his lips--the Sacrament he had just received--he
+assured him, he would find nothing in his will with which he would not
+feel pleased.  Then he recommended to him the state and the person of the
+future King.
+
+On Monday, the 26th of August, the King called to him the Cardinals de
+Rohan and de Bissy, protested that he died in the faith, and in
+submission to the Church, then added, looking at them, that he was sorry
+to leave the affairs of the Church as they were; that they knew he had
+done nothing except what they wished; that it was therefore for them to
+answer before God for what he had done; that his own conscience was
+clear, and that he was as an ignorant man who had abandoned himself
+entirely to them.  What a frightful thunderbolt was this to the two
+Cardinals; for this was an allusion to the terrible constitution they had
+assisted Pere Tellier in forcing upon him.  But their calm was superior
+to all trial.  They praised him and said he had done well, and that he
+might be at ease as to the result.
+
+This same Monday, 26th of August, after the two Cardinals had left the
+room, the King dined in his bed in the presence of those who were
+privileged to enter.  As the things were being cleared away, he made them
+approach and addressed to them these words, which were stored up in their
+memory:--"Gentlemen, I ask your pardon for the bad example I have given
+you.  I have much to thank you for the manner in which you have served
+me, and for the attachment and fidelity you have always shown for me.  I
+am very sorry I have not done for you all I should have wished to do; bad
+times have been the cause.  I ask for my grandson the same application
+and the same fidelity you have had for me.  He is a child who may
+experience many reverses.  Let your example be one for all my other
+subjects.  Follow the orders my nephew will give you; he is to govern the
+realm; I hope he will govern it well; I hope also that you will all
+contribute to keep up union, and that if any one falls away you will aid
+in bringing him back.  I feel that I am moved, and that I move you also.
+I ask your pardon.  Adieu, gentlemen, I hope you will sometimes remember
+me."
+
+A short time after he called the Marechal de Villeroy to him, and said he
+had made him governor of the Dauphin.  He then called to him M. le Duc
+and M. le Prince de Conti, and recommended to them the advantage of union
+among princes.  Then, hearing women in the cabinet, questioned who were
+there, and immediately sent word they might enter.  Madame la Duchesse de
+Berry, Madame la Duchesse d'Orleans, and the Princesses of the blood
+forthwith appeared, crying.  The King told them they must not cry thus,
+and said a few friendly words to them, and dismissed them.  They retired
+by the cabinet, weeping and crying very loudly, which caused people to
+believe outside that the King was dead; and, indeed, the rumour spread to
+Paris, and even to the provinces.
+
+Some time after the King requested the Duchesse de Ventadour to bring the
+little Dauphin to him.  He made the child approach, and then said to him,
+before Madame de Maintenon and the few privileged people present, "My
+child, you are going to be a great king; do not imitate me in the taste
+I have had for building, or in that I have had for war; try, on the
+contrary, to be at peace with your neighbours.  Render to God what you
+owe Him; recognise the obligations you are under to Him; make Him
+honoured by your subjects.  Always follow good counsels; try to comfort
+your people, which I unhappily have not done.  Never forget the
+obligation you owe to Madame de Ventadour.  Madame (addressing her), let
+me embrace him (and while embracing him), my dear child, I give you my
+benediction with my whole heart."
+
+As the little Prince was about to be taken off the bed, the King
+redemanded him, embraced him again, and raising hands and eyes to Heaven,
+blessed him once more.  This spectacle was extremely touching.
+
+On Tuesday, the 27th of August, the King said to Madame de Maintenon,
+that he had always heard, it was hard to resolve to die; but that as for
+him, seeing himself upon the point of death, he did not find this
+resolution so difficult to form.  She replied that it was very hard when
+we had attachments to creatures, hatred in our hearts, or restitutions to
+make.  "Ah," rejoined the King, "as for restitutions, to nobody in
+particular do I owe any; but as for those I owe to the realm, I hope in
+the mercy of God."
+
+The night which followed was very agitated.  The King was seen at all
+moments joining his hands, striking his breast, and was heard repeating
+the prayers he ordinarily employed.
+
+On Wednesday morning, the 28th of August, he paid a compliment to Madame
+de Maintenon, which pleased her but little, and to which she replied not
+one word.  He said, that what consoled him in quitting her was that,
+considering the age she had reached, they must soon meet again!
+
+About seven o'clock in the morning, he saw in the mirror two of his
+valets at the foot of the bed weeping, and said to them, "Why do you
+weep?  Is it because you thought me immortal?  As for me, I have not
+thought myself so, and you ought, considering my age, to have been
+prepared to lose me."
+
+A very clownish Provencal rustic heard of the extremity of the King,
+while on his way from Marseilles to Paris, and came this morning to
+Versailles with a remedy, which he said would cure the gangrene.  The
+King was so ill, and the doctors so at their wits' ends, that they
+consented to receive him.  Fagon tried to say something, but this rustic,
+who was named Le Brun, abused him very coarsely, and Fagon, accustomed to
+abuse others, was confounded.  Ten drops of Le Brun's mixture in Alicante
+wine were therefore given to the King about eleven o'clock in the
+morning.  Some time after he became stronger, but the pulse falling again
+and becoming bad, another dose was given to him about four o'clock, to
+recall him to life, they told him.  He replied, taking the mixture, "To
+life or to death as it shall please God."
+
+Le Brun's remedy was continued.  Some one proposed that the King should
+take some broth.  The King replied that it was not broth he wanted, but a
+confessor, and sent for him.  One day, recovering from loss of
+consciousness, he asked Pere Tellier to give him absolution for all his
+sins.  Pere Tellier asked him if he suffered much.  "No," replied the
+King, "that's what troubles me: I should like to suffer more for the
+expiation of my sins."
+
+On Thursday, the 29th of August, he grew a little better; he even ate two
+little biscuits steeped in wine, with a certain appetite.  The news
+immediately spread abroad that the King was recovering.  I went that day
+to the apartments of M. le Duc d'Orleans, where, during the previous
+eight days, there had been such a crowd that, speaking exactly, a pin
+would not have fallen to the ground.  Not a soul was there!  As soon as
+the Duke saw me he burst out laughing, and said, I was the first person
+who had been to see him all the day!  And until the evening he was
+entirely deserted.  Such is the world!
+
+In the evening it was known that the King had only recovered for the
+moment.  In giving orders during the day, he called the young Dauphin
+"the young King."  He saw a movement amongst those around him.  "Why
+not?"  said he, "that does not trouble me."  Towards eight o'clock he
+took the elixir of the rustic.  His brain appeared confused; he himself
+said he felt very ill.  Towards eleven o'clock his leg was examined.  The
+gangrene was found to be in the foot and the knee; the thigh much
+inflamed.  He swooned during this examination.  He had perceived with
+much pain that Madame de Maintenon was no longer near him.  She had in
+fact gone off on the previous day with very dry eyes to Saint-Cyr, not
+intending to return.  He asked for her several times during the day.  Her
+departure could not be hidden.  He sent for her to Saint-Cyr, and she
+came back in the evening.
+
+Friday, August the 30th, was a bad day preceded by a bad night.  The King
+continually lost his reason.  About five o'clock in the evening Madame de
+Maintenon left him, gave away her furniture to the domestics, and went to
+Saint-Cyr never to leave it.
+
+On Saturday, the 31st of August, everything went from bad to worse.  The
+gangrene had reached the knee and all the thigh.  Towards eleven o'clock
+at night the King was found to be so ill that the prayers for the dying
+were said.  This restored him to himself.  He repeated the prayers in a
+voice so strong that it rose above all the other voices.  At the end he
+recognised Cardinal de Rohan, and said to him, "These are the last
+favours of the Church."  This was the last man to whom he spoke.  He
+repeated several times, "Nunc et in hora mortis", then said, "Oh, my God,
+come to my aid: hasten to succour me."
+
+These were his last words.  All the night he was without consciousness
+and in a long agony, which finished on Sunday, the 1st September, 1715,
+at a quarter past eight in the morning, three days before he had
+accomplished his seventy-seventh year, and in the seventy-second of his
+reign.  He had survived all his sons and grandsons, except the King of
+Spain.  Europe never saw so long a reign or France a King so old.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LXXIII
+
+I shall pass over the stormy period of Louis XIV.'s minority.  At twenty-
+three years of age he entered the great world as King, under the most
+favourable auspices.  His ministers were the most skilful in all Europe;
+his generals the best; his Court was filled with illustrious and clever
+men, formed during the troubles which had followed the death of Louis
+XIII.
+
+Louis XIV. was made for a brilliant Court.  In the midst of other men,
+his figure, his courage, his grace, his beauty, his grand mien, even the
+tone of his voice and the majestic and natural charm of all his person,
+distinguished him till his death as the King Bee, and showed that if he
+had only been born a simple private gentlemen, he would equally have
+excelled in fetes, pleasures, and gallantry, and would have had the
+greatest success in love.  The intrigues and adventures which early in
+life he had been engaged in--when the Comtesse de Soissons lodged at the
+Tuileries, as superintendent of the Queen's household, and was the centre
+figure of the Court group--had exercised an unfortunate influence upon
+him: he received those impressions with which he could never after
+successfully struggle.  From this time, intellect, education, nobility of
+sentiment, and high principle, in others, became objects of suspicion to
+him, and soon of hatred.  The more he advanced in years the more this
+sentiment was confirmed in him.  He wished to reign by himself.  His
+jealousy on this point unceasingly became weakness.  He reigned, indeed,
+in little things; the great he could never reach: even in the former,
+too, he was often governed.  The superior ability of his early ministers
+and his early generals soon wearied him.  He liked nobody to be in any
+way superior to him.  Thus he chose his ministers, not for their
+knowledge, but for their ignorance; not for their capacity, but for their
+want of it.  He liked to form them, as he said; liked to teach them even
+the most trifling things.  It was the same with his generals.  He took
+credit to himself for instructing them; wished it to be thought that from
+his cabinet he commanded and directed all his armies.  Naturally fond of
+trifles, he unceasingly occupied himself with the most petty details of
+his troops, his household, his mansions; would even instruct his cooks,
+who received, like novices, lessons they had known by heart for years.
+This vanity, this unmeasured and unreasonable love of admiration, was his
+ruin.  His ministers, his generals, his mistresses, his courtiers, soon
+perceived his weakness.  They praised him with emulation and spoiled him.
+Praises, or to say truth, flattery, pleased him to such an extent, that
+the coarsest was well received, the vilest even better relished.  It was
+the sole means by which you could approach him.  Those whom he liked owed
+his affection for them to their untiring flatteries.  This is what gave
+his ministers so much authority, and the opportunities they had for
+adulating him, of attributing everything to him, and of pretending to
+learn everything from him.  Suppleness, meanness, an admiring, dependent,
+cringing manner--above all, an air of nothingness--were the sole means of
+pleasing him.
+
+This poison spread.  It spread, too, to an incredible extent, in a prince
+who, although of intellect beneath mediocrity, was not utterly without
+sense, and who had had some experience.  Without voice or musical
+knowledge, he used to sing, in private, the passages of the opera
+prologues that were fullest of his praises.
+
+He was drowned in vanity; and so deeply, that at his public suppers--all
+the Court present, musicians also--he would hum these self-same praises
+between his teeth, when the music they were set to was played!
+
+And yet, it must be admitted, he might have done better.  Though his
+intellect, as I have said, was beneath mediocrity, it was capable of
+being formed.  He loved glory, was fond of order and regularity; was by
+disposition prudent, moderate, discreet, master of his movements and his
+tongue.  Will it be believed?  He was also by disposition good and just!
+God had sufficiently gifted him to enable him to be a good King; perhaps
+even a, tolerably great King!  All the evil came to him from elsewhere.
+His early education was so neglected that nobody dared approach his
+apartment.  He has often been heard to speak of those times with
+bitterness, and even to relate that, one evening he was found in the
+basin of the Palais Royal garden fountain, into which he had fallen!  He
+was scarcely taught how to read or write, and remained so ignorant, that
+the most familiar historical and other facts were utterly unknown to him!
+He fell, accordingly, and sometimes even in public, into the grossest
+absurdities.
+
+It was his vanity, his desire for glory, that led him, soon after the
+death of the King of Spain, to make that event the pretext for war; in
+spite of the renunciations so recently made, so carefully stipulated, in
+the marriage contract.  He marched into Flanders; his conquests there
+were rapid; the passage of the Rhine was admirable; the triple alliance
+of England, Sweden, and Holland only animated him.  In the midst of
+winter he took Franche-Comte, by restoring which at the peace of Aix-la-
+Chapelle, he preserved his conquests in Flanders.  All was flourishing
+then in the state.  Riches everywhere.  Colbert had placed the finances,
+the navy, commerce, manufactures, letters even, upon the highest point;
+and this age, like that of Augustus, produced in abundance illustrious
+men of all kinds,-even those illustrious only in pleasures.
+
+Le Tellier and Louvois, his son, who had the war department, trembled at
+the success and at the credit of Colbert, and had no difficulty in
+putting into the head of the King a new war, the success of which caused
+such fear to all Europe that France never recovered from it, and after
+having been upon the point of succumbing to this war, for a long time
+felt the weight and misfortune of it.  Such was the real cause of that
+famous Dutch war, to which the King allowed himself to be pushed, and
+which his love for Madame de Montespan rendered so unfortunate for his
+glory and for his kingdom.  Everything being conquered, everything taken,
+and Amsterdam ready to give up her keys, the King yields to his
+impatience, quits the army, flies to Versailles, and destroys in an
+instant all the success of his arms!  He repaired this disgrace by a
+second conquest, in person, of Franche-Comte, which this time was
+preserved by France.
+
+In 1676, the King having returned into Flanders, took Conde; whilst
+Monsieur took Bouchain.  The armies of the King and of the Prince of
+Orange approached each other so suddenly and so closely, that they found
+themselves front to front near Heurtebise.  According even to the
+admission of the enemy, our forces were so superior to those of the
+Prince of Orange, that we must have gained the victory if we had
+attacked.  But the King, after listening to the opinions of his generals,
+some for, and some against giving battle, decided for the latter, turned
+tail, and the engagement was talked of no more.  The army was much
+discontented.  Everybody wished for battle.  The fault therefore of the
+King made much impression upon the troops, and excited cruel railleries
+against us at home and in the foreign courts.  The King stopped but
+little longer afterwards in the army, although we were only in the month
+of May.  He returned to his mistress.
+
+The following year he returned to Flanders, and took Cambrai; and
+Monsieur besieged Saint-Omer.  Monsieur got the start of the Prince of
+Orange, who was about to assist the place, gave him battle near Corsel,
+obtained a complete victory, immediately took Saint-Omer, and then joined
+the King.  This contrast so affected the monarch that never afterwards
+did he give Monsieur command of an army!  External appearances were
+perfectly kept up, but from that moment the resolution was taken and
+always well sustained.
+
+The year afterwards the King led in person the siege of Ghent.  The peace
+of Nimeguen ended this year the war with Holland, Spain, &c.; and on the
+commencement of the following year, that with the Emperor and the Empire.
+America, Africa, the Archipelago, Sicily, acutely felt the power of
+France, and in 1684 Luxembourg was the price of the delay of the
+Spaniards in fulfilling all the conditions of the peace.  Genoa,
+bombarded, was forced to come in the persons of its doge and four of its
+senators, to sue for peace at the commencement of the following year.
+From this date, until 1688, the time passed in the cabinet less in fetes
+than in devotion and constraint.  Here finishes the apogeum of this
+reign, and the fulness of glory and prosperity.  The great captains, the
+great ministers, were no more, but their pupils remained.  The second
+epoch of the reign was very different from the first; but the third was
+even more sadly dissimilar.
+
+I have related the adventure which led to the wars of this period; how an
+ill-made window-frame was noticed at the Trianon, then building; how
+Louvois was blamed for it; his alarm lest his disgrace should follow; his
+determination to engage the King in a war which should turn him from his
+building fancies.  He carried out his resolve: with what result I have
+already shown.  France was ruined at home; and abroad, despite the
+success of her arms, gained nothing.  On the contrary, the withdrawal of
+the King from Gembloux, when he might have utterly defeated the Prince of
+Orange, did us infinite harm, as I have shown in its place.  The peace
+which followed this war was disgraceful.  The King was obliged to
+acknowledge the Prince of Orange as King of England, after having so long
+shown hatred and contempt for him.  Our precipitation, too, cost us
+Luxembourg; and the ignorance of our plenipotentiaries gave our enemies
+great advantages in forming their frontier.  Such was the peace of
+Ryswick, concluded in September, 1697.
+
+This peace seemed as though it would allow France some breathing time.
+The King was sixty years of age, and had, in his own opinion, acquired
+all sorts of glory.  But scarcely were we at peace, without having had
+time to taste it, than the pride of the King made him wish to astonish
+all Europe by the display of a power that it believed prostrated.  And
+truly he did astonish Europe.  But at what a cost!  The famous camp of
+Compiegne--for 'tis to that I allude--was one of the most magnificent
+spectacles ever seen; but its immense and misplaced prodigality was soon
+regretted.  Twenty years afterwards, some of the regiments who took part
+in it were still in difficulties from this cause.
+
+Shortly afterwards,--by one of the most surprising and unheard-of pieces
+of good fortune, the crown of Spain fell into the hands of the Duc
+d'Anjou, grandson of the King.  It seemed as though golden days had come
+back again to France.  Only for a little time, however, did it seem so.
+Nearly all Europe, as it has been seen, banded against France, to dispute
+the Spanish crown.  The King had lost all his good ministers, all his
+able generals, and had taken good pains they should leave no successors.
+When war came, then, we were utterly unable to prosecute it with success
+or honour.  We were driven out of Germany, of Italy, of the Low
+Countries.  We could not sustain the war, or resolve to make peace.
+Every day led us nearer and nearer the brink of the precipice, the
+terrible depths of which were for ever staring us in the face.  A
+misunderstanding amongst our enemies, whereby England became detached
+from the grand alliance; the undue contempt of Prince Eugene for our
+generals, out of which arose the battle of Denain; saved us from the
+gulf.  Peace came, and a peace, too, infinitely better than that we
+should have ardently embraced if our enemies had agreed amongst
+themselves beforehand.  Nevertheless, this peace cost dear to France, and
+cost Spain half its territory--Spain, of which the King had said not even
+a windmill would he yield!  But this was another piece of folly he soon
+repented of.
+
+Thus, we see this monarch, grand, rich, conquering, the arbiter of
+Europe; feared and admired as long as the ministers and captains existed
+who really deserved the name.  When they were no more, the machine kept
+moving some time by impulsion, and from their influence.  But soon
+afterwards we saw beneath the surface; faults and errors were multiplied,
+and decay came on with giant strides; without, however, opening the eyes
+of that despotic master, so anxious to do everything and direct
+everything himself, and who seemed to indemnify himself for disdain
+abroad by increasing fear and trembling at home.
+
+So much for the reign of this vain-glorious monarch.
+
+Let me touch now upon some other incidents in his career, and upon some
+points in his character.
+
+He early showed a disinclination for Paris.  The troubles that had taken
+place there during his minority made him regard the place as dangerous;
+he wished, too, to render himself venerable by hiding himself from the
+eyes of the multitude; all these considerations fixed him at Saint-
+Germain soon after the death of the Queen, his mother.  It was to that
+place he began to attract the world by fetes and gallantries, and by
+making it felt that he wished to be often seen.
+
+His love for Madame de la Valliere, which was at first kept secret,
+occasioned frequent excursions to Versailles, then a little card castle,
+which had been built by Louis XIII.--annoyed, and his suite still more
+so, at being frequently obliged to sleep in a wretched inn there, after
+he had been out hunting in the forest of Saint Leger.  That monarch
+rarely slept at Versailles more than one night, and then from necessity;
+the King, his son, slept there, so that he might be more in private with
+his mistress, pleasures unknown to the hero and just man, worthy son of
+Saint-Louis, who built the little chateau.
+
+These excursions of Louis XIV. by degrees gave birth to those immense
+buildings he erected at Versailles; and their convenience for a numerous
+court, so different from the apartments at Saint-Germain, led him to take
+up his abode there entirely shortly after the death of the Queen.  He
+built an infinite number of apartments, which were asked for by those who
+wished to pay their court to him; whereas at Saint-Germain nearly
+everybody was obliged to lodge in the town, and the few who found
+accommodation at the chateau were strangely inconvenienced.
+
+The frequent fetes, the private promenades at Versailles, the journeys,
+were means on which the King seized in order to distinguish or mortify
+the courtiers, and thus render them more assiduous in pleasing him.
+
+He felt that of real favours he had not enough to bestow; in order to
+keep up the spirit of devotion, he therefore unceasingly invented all
+sorts of ideal ones, little preferences and petty distinctions, which
+answered his purpose as well.
+
+He was exceedingly jealous of the attention paid him.  Not only did he
+notice the presence of the most distinguished courtiers, but those of
+inferior degree also.  He looked to the right and to the left, not only
+upon rising but upon going to bed, at his meals, in passing through his
+apartments, or his gardens of Versailles, where alone the courtiers were
+allowed to follow him; he saw and noticed everybody; not one escaped him,
+not even those who hoped to remain unnoticed.  He marked well all
+absentees from the Court, found out the reason of their absence, and
+never lost an opportunity of acting towards them as the occasion might
+seem to justify.  With some of the courtiers (the most distinguished), it
+was a demerit not to make the Court their ordinary abode; with others
+'twas a fault to come but rarely; for those who never or scarcely ever
+came it was certain disgrace.  When their names were in any way
+mentioned, "I do not know them," the King would reply haughtily.  Those
+who presented themselves but seldom were thus Characterise: "They are
+people I never see;" these decrees were irrevocable.  He could not bear
+people who liked Paris.
+
+Louis XIV. took great pains to be well informed of all that passed
+everywhere; in the public places, in the private houses, in society and
+familiar intercourse.  His spies and tell-tales were infinite.  He had
+them of all species; many who were ignorant that their information
+reached him; others who knew it; others who wrote to him direct, sending
+their letters through channels he indicated; and all these letters were
+seen by him alone, and always before everything else; others who
+sometimes spoke to him secretly in his cabinet, entering by the back
+stairs.  These unknown means ruined an infinite number of people of all
+classes, who never could discover the cause; often ruined them very
+unjustly; for the King, once prejudiced, never altered his opinion, or so
+rarely, that nothing was more rare.  He had, too, another fault, very
+dangerous for others and often for himself, since it deprived him of good
+subjects.  He had an excellent memory; in this way, that if he saw a man
+who, twenty years before, perhaps, had in some manner offended him, he
+did not forget the man, though he might forget the offence.  This was
+enough, however, to exclude the person from all favour.  The
+representations of a minister, of a general, of his confessor even,
+could not move the King.  He would not yield.
+
+The most cruel means by which the King was informed of what was passing--
+for many years before anybody knew it--was that of opening letters.  The
+promptitude and dexterity with which they were opened passes
+understanding.  He saw extracts from all the letters in which there were
+passages that the chiefs of the post-office, and then the minister who
+governed it, thought ought to go before him; entire letters, too, were
+sent to him, when their contents seemed to justify the sending.  Thus the
+chiefs of the post, nay, the principal clerks were in a position to
+suppose what they pleased and against whom they pleased.  A word of
+contempt against the King or the government, a joke, a detached phrase,
+was enough.  It is incredible how many people, justly or unjustly, were
+more or less ruined, always without resource, without trial, and without
+knowing why.  The secret was impenetrable; for nothing ever cost the King
+less than profound silence and dissimulation.
+
+This last talent he pushed almost to falsehood, but never to deceit,
+pluming himself upon keeping his word,--therefore he scarcely ever gave
+it.  The secrets of others he kept as religiously as his own.  He was
+even flattered by certain confessions and certain confidences; and there
+was no mistress, minister, or favourite, who could have wormed them out,
+even though the secret regarded themselves.
+
+We know, amongst many others, the famous story of a woman of quality,
+who, after having been separated a year from her husband, found herself
+in the family way just as he was on the point of returning from the army,
+and who, not knowing what else to do, in the most urgent manner begged a
+private interview of the King.  She obtained it, and confined to him her
+position, as to the worthiest man in his realm, as she said.  The King
+counselled her to profit by her distress, and live more wisely for the
+future, and immediately promised to retain her husband on the frontier as
+long as was necessary, and to forbid his return under any pretext, and in
+fact he gave orders the same day to Louvois, and prohibited the husband
+not only all leave of absence, but forbade him to quit for a single day
+the post he was to command all the winter.  The officer, who was
+distinguished, and who had neither wished nor asked to be employed all
+the winter upon the frontier, and Louvois, who had in no way thought of
+it, were equally surprised and vexed.  They were obliged, however, to
+obey to the letter, and without asking why; and the King never mentioned
+the circumstance until many years afterwards, when he was quite sure
+nobody could find out either husband or wife, as in fact they never
+could, or even obtain the most vague or the most uncertain suspicion.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LXXIV
+
+Never did man give with better grace than Louis XIV., or augmented so
+much, in this way, the price of his benefits.  Never did man sell to
+better profit his words, even his smiles,--nay, his looks.  Never did
+disobliging words escape him; and if he had to blame, to reprimand, or
+correct, which was very rare, it was nearly always with goodness, never,
+except on one occasion (the admonition of Courtenvaux, related in its
+place), with anger or severity.  Never was man so naturally polite, or of
+a politeness so measured, so graduated, so adapted to person, time, and
+place.  Towards women his politeness was without parallel.  Never did he
+pass the humblest petticoat without raising his hat; even to chamber-
+maids, that he knew to be such, as often happened at Marly.  For ladies
+he took his hat off completely, but to a greater or less extent; for
+titled people, half off, holding it in his hand or against his ear some
+instants, more or less marked.  For the nobility he contented himself by
+putting his hand to his hat.  He took it off for the Princes of the
+blood, as for the ladies.  If he accosted ladies he did not cover himself
+until he had quitted them.  All this was out of doors, for in the house
+he was never covered.  His reverences, more or less marked, but always
+light, were incomparable for their grace and manner; even his mode of
+half raising himself at supper for each lady who arrived at table.
+Though at last this fatigued him, yet he never ceased it; the ladies who
+were to sit down, however, took care not to enter after supper had
+commenced.
+
+If he was made to wait for anything while dressing, it was always with
+patience.  He was exact to the hours that he gave for all his day, with a
+precision clear and brief in his orders.  If in the bad weather of
+winter, when he could not go out, he went to Madame de Maintenon's a
+quarter of an hour earlier than he had arranged (which seldom happened),
+and the captain of the guards was not on duty, he did not fail afterwards
+to say that it was his own fault for anticipating the hour, not that of
+the captain of the guards for being absent.  Thus, with this regularity
+which he never deviated from, he was served with the utmost exactitude.
+
+He treated his valets well, above all those of the household.  It was
+amongst them that he felt most at ease, and that he unbosomed himself the
+most familiarly, especially to the chiefs.  Their friendship and their
+aversion have often had grand results.  They were unceasingly in a
+position to render good and bad offices: thus they recalled those
+powerful enfranchised slaves of the Roman emperors, to whom the senate
+and the great people paid court and basely truckled.  These valets during
+Louis XIV.'s reign were not less courted.  The ministers, even the most
+powerful, openly studied their caprices; and the Princes of the blood,
+nay, the bastards,--not to mention people of lower grade, did the same.
+The majority were accordingly insolent enough; and if you could not avoid
+their insolence, you were forced to put up with it.
+
+The King loved air and exercise very much, as long as he could make use
+of them.  He had excelled in dancing, and at tennis and mall.  On
+horseback he was admirable, even at a late age.  He liked to see
+everything done with grace and address.  To acquit yourself well or ill
+before him was a merit or a fault.  He said that with things not
+necessary it was best not to meddle, unless they were done well.  He was
+very fond of shooting, and there was not a better or more graceful shot
+than he.  He had always, in his cabinet seven or eight pointer bitches,
+and was fond of feeding them, to make himself known to them.  He was very
+fond, too, of stag hunting; but in a caleche, since he broke his arm,
+while hunting at Fontainebleau, immediately after the death of the Queen.
+He rode alone in a species of "box," drawn by four little horses--with
+five or six relays, and drove himself with an address and accuracy
+unknown to the best coachmen.  His postilions were children from ten to
+fifteen years of age, and he directed them.
+
+He liked splendour, magnificence, and profusion in everything: you
+pleased him if you shone through the brilliancy of your houses, your
+clothes, your table, your equipages.  Thus a taste for extravagance and
+luxury was disseminated through all classes of society; causing infinite
+harm, and leading to general confusion of rank and to ruin.
+
+As for the King himself, nobody ever approached his magnificence.  His
+buildings, who could number them?  At the same time, who was there who
+did not deplore the pride, the caprice, the bad taste seen in them?  He
+built nothing useful or ornamental in Paris, except the Pont Royal, and
+that simply by necessity; so that despite its incomparable extent, Paris
+is inferior to many cities of Europe.  Saint-Germain, a lovely spot, with
+a marvellous view, rich forest, terraces, gardens, and water he abandoned
+for Versailles; the dullest and most ungrateful of all places, without
+prospect, without wood, without water, without soil; for the ground is
+all shifting sand or swamp, the air accordingly bad.
+
+But he liked to subjugate nature by art and treasure.
+
+He built at Versailles, on, on, without any general design, the beautiful
+and the ugly, the vast and the mean, all jumbled together.  His own
+apartments and those of the Queen, are inconvenient to the last degree,
+dull, close, stinking.  The gardens astonish by their magnificence, but
+cause regret by their bad taste.  You are introduced to the freshness of
+the shade only by a vast torrid zone, at the end of which there is
+nothing for you but to mount or descend; and with the hill, which is very
+short, terminate the gardens.  The violence everywhere done to nature
+repels and wearies us despite ourselves.  The abundance of water, forced
+up and gathered together from all parts, is rendered green, thick, muddy;
+it disseminates humidity, unhealthy and evident; and an odour still more
+so.  I might never finish upon the monstrous defects of a palace so
+immense and so immensely dear, with its accompaniments, which are still
+more so.
+
+But the supply of water for the fountains was all defective at all
+moments, in spite of those seas of reservoirs which had cost so many
+millions to establish and to form upon the shifting sand and marsh.  Who
+could have believed it?  This defect became the ruin of the infantry
+which was turned out to do the work.  Madame de Maintenon reigned.  M. de
+Louvois was well with her, then.  We were at peace.  He conceived the
+idea of turning the river Eure between Chartres and Maintenon, and of
+making it come to Versailles.  Who can say what gold and men this
+obstinate attempt cost during several years, until it was prohibited by
+the heaviest penalties, in the camp established there, and for a long
+time kept up; not to speak of the sick,--above all, of the dead,--that
+the hard labour and still more the much disturbed earth, caused?  How
+many men were years in recovering from the effects of the contagion!  How
+many never regained their health at all!  And not only the sub-officers,
+but the colonels, the brigadiers and general officers, were compelled to
+be upon the spot, and were not at liberty to absent themselves a quarter
+of an hour from the works.  The war at last interrupted them in 1688, and
+they have never since been undertaken; only unfinished portions of them
+exist which will immortalise this cruel folly.
+
+At last, the King, tired of the cost and bustle, persuaded himself that
+he should like something little and solitary.  He searched all around
+Versailles for some place to satisfy this new taste.  He examined several
+neighbourhoods, he traversed the hills near Saint-Germain, and the vast
+plain which is at the bottom, where the Seine winds and bathes the feet
+of so many towns, and so many treasures in quitting Paris.  He was
+pressed to fix himself at Lucienne, where Cavoye afterwards had a house,
+the view from which is enchanting; but he replied that, that fine
+situation would ruin him, and that as he wished to go to no expense, so
+he also wished a situation which would not urge him into any.  He found
+behind Lucienne a deep narrow valley, completely shut in, inaccessible
+from its swamps, and with a wretched village called Marly upon the slope
+of one of its hills.  This closeness, without drain or the means of
+having any, was the sole merit of the valley.  The King was overjoyed at
+his discovery.  It was a great work, that of draining this sewer of all
+the environs, which threw there their garbage, and of bringing soil
+thither!  The hermitage was made.  At first, it was only for sleeping in
+three nights, from Wednesday to Saturday, two or three times a-year, with
+a dozen at the outside of courtiers, to fill the most indispensable
+posts.
+
+By degrees, the hermitage was augmented, the hills were pared and cut
+down, to give at least the semblance of a prospect; in fine, what with
+buildings, gardens, waters, aqueducts, the curious and well known
+machine, statues, precious furniture, the park, the ornamental enclosed
+forest,--Marly has become what it is to-day, though it has been stripped
+since the death of the King.  Great trees were unceasingly brought from
+Compiegne or farther, three-fourths of which died and were immediately
+after replaced; vast spaces covered with thick wood, or obscure alleys,
+were suddenly changed into immense pieces of water, on which people were
+rowed in gondolas; then they were changed again into forest (I speak of
+what I have seen in six weeks); basins were changed a hundred times;
+cascades the same; carp ponds adorned with the most exquisite painting,
+scarcely finished, were changed and differently arranged by the same
+hands; and this an infinite number of times; then there was that
+prodigious machine just alluded to, with its immense aqueducts, the
+conduit, its monstrous resources solely devoted to Marly, and no longer
+to Versailles; so that I am under the mark in saying that Versailles,
+even, did not cost so much as Marly.
+
+Such was the fate of a place the abode of serpents, and of carrion, of
+toads and frogs, solely chosen to avoid expense.  Such was the bad taste
+of the King in all things, and his proud haughty pleasure in forcing
+nature; which neither the most mighty war, nor devotion could subdue!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LXXV
+
+Let me now speak of the amours of the King in which were even more fatal
+to the state than his building mania.  Their scandal filled all Europe;
+stupefied France, shook the state, and without doubt drew upon the King
+those maledictions under the weight of which he was pushed so near the
+very edge of the precipice, and had the misfortune of seeing his
+legitimate posterity within an ace of extinction in France.  These are
+evils which became veritable catastrophes and which will be long felt.
+
+Louis XIV., in his youth more made for love than any of his subjects--
+being tired of gathering passing sweets, fixed himself at last upon La
+Valliere.  The progress and the result of his love are well known.
+
+Madame de Montespan was she whose rare beauty touched him next, even
+during the reign of Madame de La Valliere.  She soon perceived it, and
+vainly pressed her husband to carry her away into Guienne.  With foolish
+confidence he refused to listen to her.  She spoke to him more in
+earnest.  In vain.  At last the King was listened to, and carried her off
+from her husband, with that frightful hubbub which resounded with horror
+among all nations, and which gave to the world the new spectacle of two
+mistresses at once!  The King took them to the frontiers, to the camps,
+to the armies, both of them in the Queen's coach.  The people ran from
+all parts to look at the three queens; and asked one another in their
+simplicity if they had seen them.  In the end, Madame de Montespan
+triumphed, and disposed of the master and his Court with an eclat that
+knew no veil; and in order that nothing should be wanting to complete the
+licence of this life, M. de Montespan was sent to the Bastille; then
+banished to Guienne, and his wife was appointed superintendent of the
+Queen's household.
+
+The accouchements of Madame de Montespan were public.  Her circle became
+the centre of the Court, of the amusements, of the hopes and of the fears
+of ministers and the generals, and the humiliation of all France.  It was
+also the centre of wit, and of a kind so peculiar, so delicate, and so
+subtle, but always so natural and so agreeable, that it made itself
+distinguished by its special character.
+
+Madame de Montespan was cross, capricious, ill-tempered, and of a
+haughtiness in everything which, readied to the clouds, and from the
+effects of which nobody, not even the King, was exempt.  The courtiers
+avoided passing under her windows, above all when the King was with her.
+They used to say it was equivalent to being put to the sword, and this
+phrase became proverbial at the Court.  It is true that she spared
+nobody, often without other design than to divert the King; and as she
+had infinite wit and sharp pleasantry, nothing was more dangerous than
+the ridicule she, better than anybody, could cast on all.  With that she
+loved her family and her relatives, and did not fail to serve people for
+whom she conceived friendship.  The Queen endured with difficulty her
+haughtiness--very different from the respect and measure with which she
+had been treated by the Duchesse de la Valliere, whom she always loved;
+whereas of Madame de Montespan she would say, "That strumpet will cause
+my death."  The retirement, the austere penitence, and the pious end of
+Madame de Montespan have been already described.
+
+During her reign she did not fail to have causes for jealousy.  There was
+Mademoiselle de Fontange, who pleased the King sufficiently to become his
+mistress.  But she had no intellect, and without that it was impossible
+to maintain supremacy over the King.  Her early death quickly put an end
+to this amour.  Then there was Madame de Soubise, who, by the infamous
+connivance of her husband, prostituted herself to the King, and thus
+secured all sorts of advantages for that husband, for herself, and for
+her children.  The love of the King for her continued until her death,
+although for many years before that he had ceased to see her in private.
+Then there was the beautiful Ludre, demoiselle of Lorraine, and maid of
+honour to Madame, who was openly loved for a moment.  But this amour was
+a flash of lightning, and Madame de Montespan remained triumphant.
+
+Let us now pass to another kind of amour which astonished all the world
+as much as the other had scandalised it, and which the King carried with
+him to the tomb.  Who does not already recognise the celebrated Francoise
+d'Aubigne, Marquise de Maintenon, whose permanent reign did not last less
+than thirty-two years?
+
+Born in the American islands, where her father, perhaps a gentleman, had
+gone to seek his bread, and where he was stifled by obscurity, she
+returned alone and at haphazard into France.  She landed at La Rochelle,
+and was received in pity by Madame de Neuillant, mother of the Marechale
+Duchesse de Navailles, and was reduced by that avaricious old woman to
+keep the keys of her granary, and to see the hay measured out to her
+horses, as I have already related elsewhere.  She came afterwards to
+Paris, young, clever, witty, and beautiful, without friends and without
+money; and by lucky chance made acquaintance with the famous Scarron.  He
+found her amiable; his friends perhaps still more so.  Marriage with this
+joyous and learned cripple appeared to her the greatest and most
+unlooked-for good fortune; and folks who were, perhaps, more in want of a
+wife than he, persuaded him to marry her, and thus raise this charming
+unfortunate from her misery.
+
+The marriage being brought about, the new spouse pleased the company
+which went to Scarron's house.  It was the fashion to go there: people of
+the Court and of the city, the best and most distinguished went.  Scarron
+was not in a state to leave his house, but the charm of his genius, of
+his knowledge, of his imagination, of that incomparable and ever fresh
+gaiety which he showed in the midst of his afflictions, that rare
+fecundity, and that humour, tempered by so much good taste that is still
+admired in his writings, drew everybody there.
+
+Madame Scarron made at home all sorts of acquaintances, which, however,
+at the death of her husband, did not keep her from being reduced to the
+charity of the parish of Saint-Eustace.  She took a chamber for herself
+and for a servant, where she lived in a very pinched manner.  Her
+personal charms by degrees improved her condition.  Villars, father of
+the Marechal; Beuvron, father of D'Harcourt; the three Villarceaux, and
+many others kept her.
+
+This set her afloat again, and, step by step, introduced her to the Hotel
+d'Albret, and thence to the Hotel de Richelieu, and elsewhere; so she
+passed from one house to the other.  In these houses Madame Scarron was
+far from being on the footing of the rest of the company.  She was more
+like a servant than a guest.  She was completely at the beck and call of
+her hosts; now to ask for firewood; now if a meal was nearly ready;
+another time if the coach of so-and-so or such a one had returned; and so
+on, with a thousand little commissions which the use of bells, introduced
+a long time after, differently disposes of.
+
+It was in these houses, principally in the Hotel de Richelieu, much more
+still in the Hotel d'Albret, where the Marechal d'Albret lived in great
+state, that Madame Scarron made the majority of her acquaintances.  The
+Marechal was cousin-german of M. de Montespan, very intimate with him,
+and with Madame de Montespan.  When she became the King's mistress he
+became her counsellor, and abandoned her husband.
+
+To the intimacy between the Marechal d'Albret and Madame de Montespan,
+Madame de Maintenon owed the good fortune she met with fourteen or
+fifteen years later.  Madame de Montespan continually visited the Hotel
+d'Albret, and was much impressed with Madame Scarron.  She conceived a
+friendship for the obliging widow, and when she had her first children by
+the King--M. du Maine and Madame la Duchesse, whom the King wished to
+conceal--she proposed that they should be confided to Madame Scarron.  A
+house in the Marais was accordingly given to her, to lodge in with them,
+and the means to bring them up, but in the utmost secrecy.  Afterwards,
+these children were taken to Madame de Montespan, then shown to the King,
+and then by degrees drawn from secrecy and avowed.  Their governess,
+being established with them at the Court, more and more pleased Madame de
+Montespan, who several times made the King give presents to her.  He, on
+the other hand, could not endure her; what he gave to her, always little,
+was by excess of complaisance and with a regret that he did not hide.
+
+The estate of Maintenon being for sale, Madame de Montespan did not let
+the King rest until she had drawn from him enough to buy it for Madame
+Scarron, who thenceforth assumed its name.  She obtained enough also for
+the repair of the chateau, and then attacked the King for means to
+arrange the garden, which the former owners had allowed to go to ruin.
+
+It was at the toilette of Madame de Montespan that these demands were
+made.  The captain of the guards alone followed the King there.  M. le
+Marechal de Lorges, the truest man that ever lived, held that post then,
+and he has often related to me the scene he witnessed.  The King at first
+turned a deaf ear to the request of Madame de Montespan, and then
+refused.  Annoyed that she still insisted, he said he had already done
+more than enough for this creature; that he could not understand the
+fancy of Madame de Montespan for her, and her obstinacy in keeping her
+after he had begged her so many times to dismiss her; that he admitted
+Madame Scarron was insupportable to him, and provided he never saw her
+more and never heard speak of her, he would open his purse again; though,
+to say truth, he had already given too much to a creature of this kind!
+Never did M. le Marechel de Lorges forget these words; and he has always
+repeated them to me and others precisely as they are given here, so
+struck was he with them, and much more after all that he saw since, so
+astonishing and so contradictory.  Madame de Montespan stopped short,
+very much troubled by having too far pressed the King.
+
+M. du Maine was extremely lame; this was caused, it was said, by a fall
+he had from his nurse's arms.  Nothing done for him succeeded; the
+resolution was then taken to send him to various practicians in Flanders,
+and elsewhere in the realm, then to the waters, among others to Bareges.
+The letters that the governess wrote to Madame de Montespan, giving an
+account of these journeys, were shown to the King.  He thought them well
+written, relished them, and the last ones made his aversion for the
+writer diminish.
+
+The ill-humour of Madame de Montespan finished the work.  She had a good
+deal of that quality, and had become accustomed to give it full swing.
+The King was the object of it more frequently than anybody; he was still
+amorous; but her ill-humour pained him.  Madame de Maintenon reproached
+Madame de Montespan for this, and thus advanced herself in the King's
+favour.  The King, by degrees, grew accustomed to speak sometimes to
+Madame de Maintenon; to unbosom to her what he wished her to say to
+Madame de Montespan; at last to relate to her the chagrin this latter
+caused him, and to consult her thereupon.
+
+Admitted thus into the intimate confidence of the lover and the mistress,
+and this by the King's own doing, the adroit waiting-woman knew how to
+cultivate it, and profited so well by her industry that by degrees she
+supplanted Madame de Montespan, who perceived, too late, that her friend
+had become necessary to the King.  Arrived at this point, Madame de
+Maintenon made, in her turn, complaints to the King of all she had to
+suffer, from a mistress who spared even him so little; and by dint of
+these mutual complaints about Madame de Montespan, Madame de Maintenon at
+last took her place, and knew well how to keep it.
+
+Fortune, I dare not say Providence, which was preparing for the
+haughtiest of kings, humiliation the most profound, the most-public, the
+most durable, the most unheard-of, strengthened more and more his taste
+for this woman, so adroit and expert at her trade; while the continued
+ill-humour and jealousy of Madame de Montespan rendered the new union
+still more solid.  It was this that Madame de Sevigne so prettily paints,
+enigmatically, in her letters to Madame de Grignan, in which she
+sometimes talks of these Court movements; for Madame de Maintenon had
+been in Paris in the society of Madame de Sevigne, of Madame de Coulange,
+of Madame de La Fayette, and had begun to make them feel her importance.
+Charming touches are to be seen in the same style upon the favour, veiled
+but brilliant enjoyed by Madame de Soubise.
+
+It was while the King was in the midst of his partiality for Madame de
+Maintenon that the Queen died.  It was at the same time, too, that the
+ill-humour of Madame de Montespan became more and more insupportable.
+This imperious beauty, accustomed to domineer and to be adored, could not
+struggle against the despair, which the prospect of her fall caused her.
+What carried her beyond all bounds, was that she could no longer disguise
+from herself, that she had an abject rival whom she had supported, who
+owed everything to her; whom she had so much liked that she had several
+times refused to dismiss her when pressed to do so by the King; a rival,
+too, so beneath her in beauty, and older by several years; to feel that
+it was this lady's-maid, not to say this servant, that the King most
+frequently went to see; that he sought only her; that he could not
+dissimulate his uneasiness if he did not find her; that he quitted all
+for her; in fine, that at all moments she (Madame de Montespan) needed
+the intervention of Madame de Maintenon, in order to attract the King to
+reconcile her with him, or to obtain the favours she asked for.  It was
+then, in times so propitious to the enchantress, that the King became
+free by the death of the Queen.
+
+He passed the first few days at Saint-Cloud, at Monsieur's, whence he
+went to Fontainebleau, where he spent all the autumn.  It was there that
+his liking, stimulated by absence, made him find that absence
+insupportable.  Upon his return it is pretended--for we must distinguish
+the certain from that which is not so--it is pretended, I say, that the
+King spoke more freely to Madame de Maintenon, and that she; venturing to
+put forth her strength, intrenched herself behind devotion and prudery;
+that the King did not cease, that she preached to him and made him afraid
+of the devil, and that she balanced his love against his conscience with
+so much art, that she succeeded in becoming what our eyes have seen her,
+but what posterity will never believe she was.
+
+But what is very certain and very true, is, that some time after the
+return of the King from Fontainebleau, and in the midst of the winter
+that followed the death of the Queen (posterity will with difficulty
+believe it, although perfectly true and proved), Pere de la Chaise,
+confessor of the King, said mass at the dead of night in one of the
+King's cabinets at Versailles.  Bontems, governor of Versailles, chief
+valet on duty, and the most confidential of the four, was present at this
+mass, at which the monarch and La Maintenon were married in presence of
+Harlay, Archbishop of Paris, as diocesan, of Louvois (both of whom drew
+from the King a promise that he would never declare this marriage), and
+of Montchevreuil.  This last was a relative and friend of Villarceaux, to
+whom during the summer he lent his house at Montchevreuil, remaining
+there himself, however, with his wife; and in that house Villarceaux kept
+Madame Scarron, paying all the expenses because his relative was poor,
+and because he (Villarceaux) was ashamed to take her to his own home, to
+live in concubinage with her in the presence of his wife whose patience
+and virtue he respected.
+
+The satiety of the honeymoon, usually so fatal, and especially the
+honeymoon of such marriages, only consolidated the favour of Madame de
+Maintenon.  Soon after, she astonished everybody by the apartments given
+to her at Versailles, at the top of the grand staircase facing those of
+the King and on the same floor.  From that moment the King always passed
+some hours with her every day of his life; wherever she might be she was
+always lodged near him, and on the same floor if possible.
+
+What manner of person she was,--this incredible enchantress,--and how she
+governed all-powerfully for more than thirty years, it behoves me now to
+explain!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LXXVI
+
+Madame de Maintenon was a woman of much wit, which the good company, in
+which she had at first been merely suffered, but in which she soon shone,
+had much polished; and ornamented with knowledge of the world, and which
+gallantry had rendered of the most agreeable kind.  The various positions
+she had held had rendered her flattering, insinuating, complaisant,
+always seeking to please.  The need she had of intrigues, those she had
+seen of all kinds, and been mixed up in for herself and for others, had
+given her the taste, the ability, and the habit of them.  Incomparable
+grace, an easy manner, and yet measured and respectful, which, in
+consequence of her long obscurity, had become natural to her,
+marvellously aided her talents; with language gentle, exact, well
+expressed, and naturally eloquent and brief.  Her best time, for she was
+three or four years older than the King, had been the dainty phrase
+period;--the superfine gallantry days,--in a word, the time of the
+"ruelles," as it was called; and it had so influenced her that she always
+retained evidences of it.  She put on afterwards an air of importance,
+but this gradually gave place to one of devoutness that she wore
+admirably.  She was not absolutely false by disposition, but necessity
+had made her so, and her natural flightiness made her appear twice as
+false as she was.
+
+The distress and poverty in which she had so long lived had narrowed her
+mind, and abased her heart and her sentiments.  Her feelings and her
+thoughts were so circumscribed, that she was in truth always less even
+than Madame Scarron, and in everything and everywhere she found herself
+such.  Nothing was more repelling than this meanness, joined to a
+situation so radiant.
+
+Her flightiness or inconstancy was of the most dangerous kind.  With the
+exception of some of her old friends, to whom she had good reasons for
+remaining faithful, she favoured people one moment only to cast them off
+the next.  You were admitted to an audience with her for instance, you
+pleased her in some manner, and forthwith she unbosomed herself to you as
+though you had known her from childhood.  At the second audience you
+found her dry, laconic, cold.  You racked your brains to discover the
+cause of this change.  Mere loss of time!--Flightiness was the sole
+reason of it.
+
+Devoutness was her strong point; by that she governed and held her place.
+She found a King who believed himself an apostle, because he had all his
+life persecuted Jansenism, or what was presented to him as such.  This
+indicated to her with what grain she could sow the field most profitably.
+
+The profound ignorance in which the King had been educated and kept all
+his life, rendered him from the first an easy prey to the Jesuits.  He
+became even more so with years, when he grew devout, for he was devout
+with the grossest ignorance.  Religion became his weak point.  In this
+state it was easy to persuade him that a decisive and tremendous blow
+struck against the Protestants would give his name more grandeur than any
+of his ancestors had acquired, besides strengthening his power and
+increasing his authority.  Madame de Maintenon was one of those who did
+most to make him believe this.
+
+The revocation of the edict of Nantes, without the slightest pretext or
+necessity, and the various proscriptions that followed it, were the
+fruits of a frightful plot, in which the new spouse was one of the chief
+conspirators, and which depopulated a quarter of the realm, ruined its
+commerce, weakened it in every direction, gave it up for a long time to
+the public and avowed pillage of the dragoons, authorised torments and
+punishments by which so many innocent people of both sexes were killed by
+thousands; ruined a numerous class; tore in pieces a world of families;
+armed relatives against relatives, so as to seize their property and
+leave them to die of hunger; banished our manufactures to foreign lands,
+made those lands flourish and overflow at the expense of France, and
+enabled them to build new cities; gave to the world the spectacle of a
+prodigious population proscribed, stripped, fugitive, wandering, without
+crime, and seeking shelter far from its country; sent to the galleys,
+nobles, rich old men, people much esteemed for their piety, learning, and
+virtue, people well off, weak, delicate, and solely on account of
+religion; in fact, to heap up the measure of horror, filled all the realm
+with perjury and sacrilege, in the midst of the echoed cries of these
+unfortunate victims of error, while so many others sacrificed their
+conscience to their wealth and their repose, and purchased both by
+simulated abjuration, from which without pause they were dragged to adore
+what they did not believe in, and to receive the divine body of the Saint
+of Saints whilst remaining persuaded that they were only eating bread
+which they ought to abhor!  Such was the general abomination born of
+flattery and cruelty.  From torture to abjuration, and from that to the
+communion, there was often only twenty-four hours' distance; and
+executioners were the conductors of the converts and their witnesses.
+Those who in the end appeared to have been reconciled, more at leisure
+did not fail by their flight, or their behaviour, to contradict their
+pretended conversion.
+
+The King received from all sides news and details of these persecutions
+and of these conversions.  It was by thousands that those who had abjured
+and taken the communion were counted; ten thousand in one place; six
+thousand in another--all at once and instantly.  The King congratulated
+himself on his power and his piety.  He believed himself to have renewed
+the days of the preaching of the Apostles, and attributed to himself all
+the honour.  The bishops wrote panegyrics of him, the Jesuits made the
+pulpit resound with his praises.  All France was filled with horror and
+confusion; and yet there never was so much triumph and joy--never such
+profusion of laudations!  The monarch doubted not of the sincerity of
+this crowd of conversions; the converters took good care to persuade him
+of it and to beatify him beforehand.  He swallowed their poison in long.
+draughts.  He had never yet believed himself so great in the eyes of man,
+or so advanced in the eyes of God, in the reparation of his sins and of
+the scandals of his life.  He heard nothing but eulogies, while the good
+and true Catholics and the true bishops, groaned in spirit to see the
+orthodox act towards error and heretics as heretical tyrants and heathens
+had acted against the truth, the confessors, and the martyrs.  They could
+not, above all, endure this immensity of perjury and sacrilege.  They
+bitterly lamented the durable and irremediable odium that detestable
+measure cast upon the true religion, whilst our neighbours, exulting to
+see us thus weaken and destroy ourselves, profited by our madness, and
+built designs upon the hatred we should draw upon ourselves from all the
+Protestant powers.
+
+But to these spearing truths, the King was inaccessible.  Even the
+conduct of Rome in this matter, could not open his eyes.  That Court
+which formerly had not been ashamed to extol the Saint-Bartholomew, to
+thank God for it by public processions, to employ the greatest masters to
+paint this execrable action in the Vatican; Rome, I say, would not give
+the slightest approbation to this onslaught on the Huguenots.
+
+The magnificent establishment of Saint-Cyr, followed closely upon the
+revocation of the edict of Nantes.  Madame de Montespan had founded at
+Paris an establishment for the instruction of young girls in all sorts of
+fine and ornamental work.  Emulation gave Madame de Maintenon higher and
+vaster views which, whilst gratifying the poor nobility, would cause her
+to be regarded as protectress in whom all the nobility would feel
+interested.  She hoped to smooth the way for a declaration of her
+marriage, by rendering herself illustrious by a monument with which she
+could amuse both the King and herself, and which might serve her as a
+retreat if she had the misfortune to lose him, as in fact it happened.
+
+This declaration of her marriage was always her most ardent desire.  She
+wished above all things to be proclaimed Queen; and never lost sight of
+the idea.  Once she was near indeed upon seeing it gratified.  The King
+had actually given her his word, that she should be declared; and the
+ceremony was forthwith about to take place.  But it was postponed, and
+for ever, by the representations of Louvois to the King.  To this
+interference that minister owed his fall, and under circumstances so
+surprising and so strange, that I cannot do better, I think, than
+introduce an account of them here, by way of episode.  They are all the
+more interesting because they show what an unlimited power Madame de
+Maintenon exercised by subterranean means, and with what patient
+perseverance she undermined her enemies when once she had resolved to
+destroy them.
+
+Lauvois had gained the confidence of the King to such an extent, that he
+was, as I have said, one of the two witnesses of the frightful marriage
+of his Majesty with Madame de Maintenon.  He had the courage to show he
+was worthy of this confidence, by representing to the King the ignominy
+of declaring that marriage, and drew from him his word, that never in his
+life would he do so.
+
+Several years afterwards, Louvois, who took care to be well informed of
+all that passed in the palace, found out that Madame de Maintenon had
+been again scheming in order to be declared Queen; that the King had had
+the weakness to promise she should be, and that the declaration was about
+to be made.  He put some papers in his hand, and at once went straight to
+the King, who was in a very private room.  Seeing Louvois at an
+unexpected hour, he asked him what brought him there.  "Something
+pressing and important," replied Louvois, with a sad manner that
+astonished the King, and induced him to command the valets present to
+quit the room.  They went away in fact, but left the door open, so that
+they could hear all, and see all, too, by the glass.  This was the great
+danger of the cabinets.
+
+The valets being gone, Louvois did not dissimulate from the King his
+mission.  The monarch was often false, but incapable of rising above his
+own falsehood.  Surprised at being discovered, he tried to shuffle out of
+the matter, and pressed by his minister, began to move so as to gain the
+other cabinet where the valets were, and thus deliver himself from this
+hobble.  But Louvois, who perceived what he was about, threw himself on
+his knees and stopped him, drew from his side a little sword he wore,
+presented the handle to the King, and prayed him to kill him on the spot,
+if he would persist in declaring his marriage, in breaking his word, and
+covering himself in the eyes of Europe with infamy.  The King stamped,
+fumed, told Louvois to let him go.  But Louvois squeezed him tighter by
+the legs for fear he should escape; represented to him the shame of what
+he had decided on doing; in a word, succeeded so well, that he drew for
+the second time from the King, a promise that the marriage should never
+be declared.
+
+Madame de Maintenon meanwhile expected every moment to be proclaimed
+Queen.  At the end of some days disturbed by the silence of the King,
+she ventured to touch upon the subject.  The embarrassment she caused the
+King much troubled her.  He softened the affair as much as he could, but
+finished by begging her to think no more of being declared, and never to
+speak of it to him again!  After the first shock that the loss of her
+hopes caused her, she sought to find out to whom she was beholden for it.
+She soon learned the truth; and it is not surprising that she swore to
+obtain Louvois's disgrace, and never ceased to work at it until
+successful.  She waited her opportunity, and undermined her enemy at
+leisure, availing herself of every occasion to make him odious to the
+King.
+
+Time passed.  At length it happened that Louvois, not content with the
+terrible executions in the Palatinate, which he had counselled, wished to
+burn Treves.  He proposed it to the King.  A dispute arose between them,
+but the King would not or could not be persuaded.  It may be imagined
+that Madame de Maintenon did not do much to convince him.
+
+Some days afterwards Louvois, who had the fault of obstinacy, came as
+usual to work with the King in Madame de Maintenon's rooms.  At the end
+of the sitting he said, that he felt convinced that it was scrupulousness
+alone which had hindered the King from consenting to so necessary an act
+as the burning, of Treves, and that he had, therefore, taken the
+responsibility on himself by sending a courier with orders to set fire to
+the place at once.
+
+The King was immediately, and contrary to his nature, so transported with
+anger that he seized the tongs, and was about to make a run at Louvois,
+when Madame de Maintenon placed herself between them, crying, "Oh, Sire,
+what are you going to do?" and took the tongs from his hands.
+
+Louvois, meanwhile, gained the door.  The King cried after him to recall
+him, and said, with flashing eyes: "Despatch a courier instantly with a
+counter order, and let him arrive in time; for, know this: if a single
+house is burned your head shall answer for it."  Louvois, more dead than
+alive, hastened away at once.
+
+Of course, he had sent off no courier.  He said he had, believing that by
+this trick the King, though he might be angry, would be led to give way.
+He had reckoned wrongly, however, as we have seen.
+
+From this time forward Louvois became day by day more distasteful to the
+King.  In the winter of 1690, he proposed that, in order to save expense,
+the ladies should not accompany the King to the siege of Mons.  Madame de
+Maintenon, we may be sure, did not grow more kindly disposed towards him
+after this.  But as it is always the last drop of water that makes the
+glass overflow, so a trifle that happened at this siege, completed the
+disgrace of Louvois.
+
+The King, who plumed himself upon knowing better than anybody the
+minutest military details, walking one day about the camp, found an
+ordinary cavalry guard ill-posted, and placed it differently.  Later the
+same day he again visited by chance the spot, and found the guard
+replaced as at first.  He was surprised and shocked.  He asked the
+captain who had done this, and was told it was Louvois.
+
+"But," replied the King, "did you not tell him 'twas I who had placed
+you?"
+
+"Yes, Sire," replied the captain.  The King piqued, turned towards his
+suite, and said: "That's Louvois's trade, is it not?  He thinks himself a
+great captain, and that he knows everything," and forthwith he replaced
+the guard as he had put it in the morning.  It was, indeed, foolishness
+and insolence on the part of Louvois, and the King had spoken truly of
+him.  The King was so wounded that he could not pardon him.  After
+Louvois's death, he related this incident to Pomponne, still annoyed at
+it, as I knew by means of the Abbe de Pomponne.
+
+After the return from Mons the dislike of the King for Louvois augmented
+to such an extent, that this minister, who was so presumptuous, and who
+thought himself so necessary, began to tremble.  The Marechale de
+Rochefort having gone with her daughter, Madame de Blansac, to dine with
+him at Meudon, he took them out for a ride in a little 'calache', which
+he himself drove.  They heard him repeatedly say to himself, musing
+profoundly, "Will he?  Will he be made to?  No--and yet--no, he will not
+dare."
+
+During this monologue Louvois was so absorbed that he was within an ace
+of driving them all into the water, and would have done so, had they not
+seized the reins, and cried out that he was going to drown them.  At
+their cries and movement, Louvois awoke as from a deep sleep, drew up,
+and turned, saying that, indeed, he was musing, and not thinking of the
+vehicle.
+
+I was at Versailles at that time, and happened to call upon Louvois about
+some business of my father's.
+
+The same day I met him after dinner as he was going to work with the
+King.  About four o'clock in the afternoon I learned that he had been
+taken rather unwell at Madame de Maintenon's, that the King had forced
+him to go home, that he had done so on foot, that some trifling remedy
+was administered to him there, and that during the operation of it he
+died!
+
+The surprise of all the Court may be imagined.  Although I was little
+more than fifteen years of age, I wished to see the countenance of the
+King after the occurrence of an event of this kind.  I went and waited
+for him, and followed him during all his promenade.  He appeared to me
+with his accustomed majesty, but had a nimble manner, as though he felt
+more free than usual.  I remarked that, instead of going to see his
+fountains, and diversifying his walk as usual, he did nothing but walk up
+and down by the balustrade of the orangery, whence he could see, in
+returning towards the chateau, the lodging in which Louvois had just
+died, and towards which he unceasingly looked.
+
+The name of Louvois was never afterwards pronounced; not a word was said
+upon this death so surprising, and so sudden, until the arrival of an
+officer, sent by the King of England from Saint-Germain, who came to the
+King upon this terrace, and paid him a compliment of condolence upon the
+loss he had received.
+
+"Monsieur," replied the King, in a tone and with a manner more than easy,
+"give my compliments and my thanks to the King and Queen of England, and
+say to them in my name, that my affairs and theirs will go on none the
+worse for what has happened."
+
+The officer made a bow and retired, astonishment painted upon his face,
+and expressed in all his bearing.  I anxiously observed all this, and
+also remarked, that all the principal people around the King looked at
+each other, but said no word.  The fact was, as I afterwards learned,
+that Louvois, when he died, was so deeply in disgrace, that the very next
+day he was to have been arrested and sent to the Bastille!  The King told
+Chamillart so, and Chamillart related it to me.  This explains, I fancy,
+the joy of the King at the death of his minister; for it saved him from
+executing the plan he had resolved on.
+
+The suddenness of the disease and death of Louvois caused much talk,
+especially when, on the opening of the body, it was discovered that he
+had been poisoned.  A servant was arrested on the charge; but before the
+trial took place he was liberated, at the express command of the King,
+and the whole affair was hushed up.  Five or six months afterwards Seron,
+private physician of Louvois, barricaded himself in his apartment at
+Versailles, and uttered dreadful cries.  People came but he refused to
+open; and as the door could not be forced, he went on shrieking all day,
+without succour, spiritual or temporal, saying at last that he had got
+what he deserved for what he had done to his master; that he was a wretch
+unworthy of help; and so he died despairing, in eight or ten hours,
+without having spoken of any ones or uttered a single name!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LXXVII
+
+It must not be imagined that in order to maintain her position Madame de
+Maintenon had need of no address.  Her reign, on the contrary, was only
+one continual intrigue; and that of the King a perpetual dupery.
+
+Her mornings, which she commenced very early, were occupied with obscure
+audiences for charitable or spiritual affairs.  Pretty often, at eight
+o'clock in the morning, or earlier, she went to some minister; the
+ministers of war, above all those of finance, were those with whom she
+had most business.
+
+Ordinarily as soon as she rose, she went to Saint-Cyr, dined in her
+apartment there alone, or with some favourite of the house, gave as few
+audiences as possible, ruled over the arrangements of the establishment,
+meddled with the affairs of convents, read and replied to letters,
+directed the affairs of the house, received information and letters from
+her spies, and returned to Versailles just as the King was ready to enter
+her rooms.  When older and more infirm, she would lie down in bed on
+arriving between seven and eight o'clock in the morning at Saint-Cyr, or
+take some remedy.
+
+Towards nine o'clock in the evening two waiting-women came to undress
+her.  Immediately afterwards, her maitre d'hotel, or a valet de chambre
+brought her her supper--soup, or something light.  As soon as she had
+finished her meal, her women put her to bed, and all this in the presence
+of the King and his minister, who did not cease working or speak lower.
+This done, ten o'clock had arrived; the curtains of Madame de Maintenon
+were drawn, and the King went to supper, after saying good night to her.
+
+When with the King in her own room, they each occupied an armchair, with
+a table between them, at either side of the fireplace, hers towards the
+bed, the King's with the back to the wall, where was the door of the
+ante-chamber; two stools were before the table, one for the minister who
+came to work, the other for his papers.
+
+During the work Madame de Maintenon read or worked at tapestry.  She
+heard all that passed between the King and his minister, for they spoke
+out loud.  Rarely did she say anything, or, if so, it was of no moment.
+The King often asked her opinion; then she replied with great discretion.
+Never did she appear to lay stress on anything, still less to interest
+herself for anybody, but she had an understanding with the minister, who
+did not dare to oppose her in private, still less to trip in her
+presence.  When some favour or some post was to be granted, the matter
+was arranged between them beforehand; and this it was that sometimes
+delayed her, without the King or anybody knowing the cause.
+
+She would send word to the minister that she wished to speak to him.  He
+did not dare to bring anything forward until he had received her orders;
+until the revolving mechanism of each day had given them the leisure to
+confer together.  That done, the minister proposed and showed a list.  If
+by chance the King stopped at the name Madame de Maintenon wished, the
+minister stopped too, and went no further.  If the King stopped at some
+other, the minister proposed that he should look at those which were also
+fitting, allowed the King leisure to make his observations, and profited
+by them, to exclude the people who were not wanted.  Rarely did he
+propose expressly the name to which he wished to come, but always
+suggested several that he tried to balance against each other, so as to
+embarrass the King in his choice.  Then the King asked his opinion, and
+the minister, after touching upon other names, fixed upon the one he had
+selected.
+
+The King nearly always hesitated, and asked Madame de Maintenon what she
+thought.  She smiled, shammed incapacity, said a word upon some other
+name, then returned, if she had not fixed herself there at first, to that
+which the minister had proposed; so that three-fourths of the favours and
+opportunities which passed through the hands of the ministers in her
+rooms--and three-fourths even of the remaining fourth-were disposed of by
+her.  Sometimes when she had nobody for whom she cared, it was the
+minister, with her consent and her help, who decided, without the King
+having the least suspicion.  He thought he disposed of everything by
+himself; whilst, in fact, he disposed only of the smallest part, and
+always then by chance, except on the rare occasions when he specially
+wished to favour some one.
+
+As for state matters, if Madame de Maintenon wished to make them succeed,
+fail, or turn in some particular fashion (which happened much less often
+than where favours and appointments were in the wind), the same
+intelligence and the same intrigue were carried on between herself and
+the minister.  By these particulars it will be seen that this clever
+woman did nearly all she wished, but not when or how she wished.
+
+There was another scheme if the King stood out; it was to avoid decision
+by confusing and spinning out the matter in hand, or by substituting
+another as though arising, opportunely out of it, and by which it was
+turned aside, or by proposing that some explanations should be obtained.
+The first ideas of the King were thus weakened, and the charge was
+afterwards returned to, with the same address, oftentimes with success.
+
+It is this which made the ministers so necessary to Madame de Maintenon,
+and her so necessary to them: She rendered them, in fact, continual
+services by means of the King, in return for the services they rendered
+her.  The mutual concerns, therefore, between her and them were infinite;
+the King, all the while, not having the slightest suspicion of what was
+going on!
+
+The power of Madame de Maintenon was, as may be imagined, immense.  She
+had everybody in her hands, from the highest and most favoured minister
+to the meanest subject of the realm.  Many people have been ruined by
+her, without having been able to discover the author of their ruin,
+search as they might.  All attempts to find a remedy were equally
+unsuccessful.
+
+Yet the King was constantly on his guard, not only against Madame de
+Maintenon, but against his ministers also.  Many a time it happened that
+when sufficient care had not been taken, and he perceived that a minister
+or a general wished to favour a relative or protege of Madame de
+Maintenon, he firmly opposed the appointment on that account alone, and
+the remarks he uttered thereupon made Madame de Maintenon very timid and
+very measured when she wished openly to ask a favour.
+
+Le Tellier, long before he was made Chancellor, well knew the mood of the
+King.  One of his friends asked him for some place that he much desired.
+Le Tellier replied that he would do what he could.  The friend did not
+like this reply, and frankly said that it was not such as he expected
+from a man with such authority.  "You do not know the ground," replied Le
+Tellier; "of twenty matters that we bring before the King, we are sure he
+will pass nineteen according to our wishes; we are equally certain that
+the twentieth will be decided against them.  But which of the twenty will
+be decided contrary to our desire we never know, although it may be the
+one we have most at heart.  The King reserves to himself this caprice, to
+make us feel that he is the master, and that he governs; and if, by
+chance, something is presented upon which he is obstinate, and which is
+sufficiently important for us to be obstinate about also, either on
+account of the thing itself, or for the desire we have that it should
+succeed as we wish, we very often get a dressing; but, in truth, the
+dressing over, and the affair fallen through, the King, content with
+having showed that we can do nothing, and pained by having vexed us,
+becomes afterwards supple and flexible, so that then is the time at which
+we can do all we wish."
+
+This is, in truth, how the King conducted himself with his ministers,
+always completely governed by them, even by the youngest and most
+mediocre, even by the least accredited and the least respected--yet
+always on his guard against being governed, and always persuaded that he
+succeeded fully in avoiding it.
+
+He adopted the same conduct towards Madame de Maintenon, whom at times he
+scolded terribly, and applauded himself for so doing.  Sometimes she
+threw herself on her knees before him, and for several days was really
+upon thorns.  When she had appointed Fagon physician of the King in place
+of Daquin, whom she dismissed, she had a doctor upon whom she could
+certainly rely, and she played the sick woman accordingly, after those
+scenes with the King, and in this manner turned them to her own
+advantage.
+
+It was not that this artifice had any power in constraining the King, or
+that a real illness would have had any.  He was a man solely personal,
+and who counted others only as they stood in relation to himself.  His
+hard-heartedness, therefore, was extreme.  At the time when he was most
+inclined towards his mistresses, whatever indisposition they might labour
+under, even the most opposed to travelling and to appearing in full court
+dress, could not save them from either.  When enceinte, or ill, or just
+risen from child birth, they must needs be squeezed into full dress, go
+to Flanders or further, dance; sit up, attend fetes, eat, be merry and
+good company; go from place to place; appear neither to fear, nor to be
+inconvenienced by heat, cold, wind, or dust; and all this precisely to
+the hour and day, without a minute's grace.
+
+His daughters he treated in the same manner.  It has been seen, in its
+place, that he had no more consideration for Madame la Duchesse de Berry,
+nor even for Madame la Duchesse de Bourgogne--whatever Fagon, Madame de
+Maintenon, and others might do or say.  Yet he loved Madame la Duchesse
+de Bourgogne as tenderly as he was capable of loving anybody: but both
+she and Madame la Duchesse de Berry had miscarriages, which relieved him,
+he said, though they then had no children.
+
+When he travelled, his coach was always full of women; his mistresses,
+afterwards his bastards, his daughters-in-law, sometimes Madame, and
+other ladies when there was room.  In the coach, during his journeys,
+there were always all sorts of things to eat, as meat, pastry, fruit.
+A quarter of a league was not passed over before the King asked if
+somebody would not eat.  He never ate anything between meals himself,
+not even fruit; but he amused himself by seeing others do so, aye,
+and to bursting.  You were obliged to be hungry, merry, and to eat with
+appetite, otherwise he was displeased, and even showed it.  And yet after
+this, if you supped with him at table the same day, you were compelled to
+eat with as good a countenance as though you had tasted nothing since the
+previous night.  He was as inconsiderate in other and more delicate
+matters; and ladies, in his long drives and stations, had often occasion
+to curse him.  The Duchesse de Chevreuse once rode all the, way from
+Versailles to Fontainebleau in such extremity, that several times she was
+well-nigh losing consciousness.
+
+The King, who was fond of air, liked all the windows to be lowered;
+he would have been much displeased had any lady drawn a curtain for
+protection against sun, wind, or cold.  No inconvenience or incommodity
+was allowed to be even perceived; and the King always went very quickly,
+most frequently with relays.  To faint was a fault past hope of pardon.
+
+Madame de Maintenon, who feared the air and many other inconveniences,
+could gain no privilege over the others.  All she obtained, under
+pretence of modesty and other reasons, was permission to journey apart;
+but whatever condition she might be in, she was obliged to follow the
+King, and be ready to receive him in her rooms by the time he was ready
+to enter them.  She made many journeys to Marly in a state such as would
+have saved a servant from movement.  She made one to Fontainebleau when
+it seemed not unlikely that she would die on the road!  In whatever
+condition she might be, the King went to her at his ordinary hour and did
+what he had projected; though several times she was in bed, profusely
+sweating away a fever.  The King, who as I have said, was fond of air,
+and feared warm rooms, was astonished upon arriving to find everything
+close shut, and ordered the windows to be opened; would not spare them an
+inch; and up to ten o'clock, when he went to supper, kept them open,
+utterly regardless of the cool night air, although he knew well what a
+state she was in.  If there was to be music, fever or headache availed
+not; a hundred wax candles flashed all the same in her eyes.  The King,
+in fact, always followed his own inclination, without ever asking whether
+she was inconvenienced.
+
+The tranquillity and pious resignation of the King during the last days
+of his illness, was a matter of some surprise to many people, as, indeed,
+it deserved to be.  By way of explanation, the doctors said that the
+malady he died of, while it deadens and destroys all bodily pain, calms
+and annihilates all heart pangs and agitation of the mind.
+
+They who were in the sick-chamber, during the last days of his illness,
+gave another reason.
+
+The Jesuits constantly admit the laity, even married, into their company.
+This fact is certain.  There is no doubt that Des Noyers, Secretary of
+State under Louis XIII., was of this number, or that many others have
+been so too.  These licentiates make the same vow as the Jesuits, as far
+as their condition admits: that is, unrestricted obedience to the
+General, and to the superiors of the company.  They are obliged to supply
+the place of the vows of poverty and chastity, by promising to give all
+the service and all the protection in their power to the Company, above
+all, to be entirely submissive to the superiors and to their confessor.
+They are obliged to perform, with exactitude, such light exercises of
+piety as their confessor may think adapted to the circumstances of their
+lives, and that he simplifies as much as he likes.  It answers the
+purpose of the Company to ensure to itself those hidden auxiliaries whom
+it lets off cheaply.  But nothing must pass through their minds, nothing
+must come to their knowledge that they do not reveal to their confessor;
+and that which is not a secret of the conscience, to the superiors, if
+the confessor thinks fit.  In everything, too, they must obey without
+comment, the superior and the confessors.
+
+It has been pretended that Pere Tellier had inspired the King, long
+before his death, with the desire to be admitted, on this footing, into
+the Company; that he had vaunted to him the privileges and plenary
+indulgences attached to it; that he had persuaded him that whatever
+crimes had been committed, and whatever difficulty there might be in
+making amends for them, this secret profession washed out all, and
+infallibly assured salvation, provided that the vows were faithfully
+kept; that the General of the Company was admitted into the secret with
+the consent of the King; that the King pronounced the vows before Pere
+Tellier; that in the last days of his life they were heard, the one
+fortifying, the other resposing upon these promises; that, at last,
+the King received from Pere Tellier the final benediction of the Company,
+as one of its members; that Pere Tellier made the King offer up prayers,
+partly heard, of a kind to leave no doubt of the matter; and that he had
+given him the robe, or the almost imperceptible sign, as it were, a sort
+of scapulary, which was found upon him.  To conclude, the majority of
+those who approached the King in his last moments attributed his
+penitence to the artifices and persuasions of the Jesuits, who, for
+temporal interests, deceive sinners even up to the edge of the tomb, and
+conduct them to it in profound peace by a path strewn with flowers.
+
+However it is but fair to say, that Marechal, who was very trustful,
+assured me he had never perceived anything which justified this idea, and
+that he was persuaded there was not the least truth in it; and I think,
+that although he was not always in the chamber or near the bed, and
+although Pere Tellier might mistrust and try to deceive him, still if the
+King had been made a Jesuit as stated, Marechal must have had sore
+knowledge or some suspicion of the circumstance.
+
+
+
+
+ETEXT EDITOR'S BOOKMARKS:
+
+Depopulated a quarter of the realm
+He liked nobody to be in any way superior to him
+He was born bored; he was so accustomed to live out of himself
+He was scarcely taught how to read or write
+It is a sign that I have touched the sore point
+Pope not been ashamed to extol the Saint-Bartholomew
+Revocation of the edict of Nantes
+Seeing him eat olives with a fork!
+Touched, but like a man who does not wish to seem so
+Unreasonable love of admiration, was his ruin
+Who counted others only as they stood in relation to himself
+
+
+
+
+End of this Project Gutenberg Etext Memoirs of Louis XIV. and The Regency,
+v10, by the Duc de Saint-Simon
+
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