PARIS, Friday, May 30, 1672.
I had no letter from you yesterday, my poor child. Your journey to
Monaco had put you quite out of sorts. I was afraid some little
disaster of this kind would befall me. I now send you news from M. de
Pomponne; the fashion of being wounded is already begun; my heart is
very heavy with the fears of this campaign. My son writes by every
opportunity; he is at present in good health.
My aunt is still in a deplorable state, and yet we have the courage to
think of appointing a day for our departure, assuming a hope which in
reality we can not entertain. I can not help thinking that many of the
events of life are ill-arranged; they are, as it were, rugged stones
lying across our way, too unwieldy to be removed, and which we must
get over as well as we can, though not without pain and difficulty. Is
not the comparison just? I shall not bring my little girl with me; she
goes on very well at Livri, and is to stay there during the summer. You
never saw Livri in such perfection as it is at present; the trees are
beautifully green, and the honeysuckles are every where in profusion.
I am not yet tired of their perfume. But you despise our shrubberies
since you have been accustomed to your groves of orange-trees.
I have a very tragical history to communicate to you from Livri. Do
you remember that pretended devotee, who walked so steadily without
turning his head that you would have thought he was carrying a glass
of water upon it? His devotion has turned his brain. One night he gave
himself five or six stabs with a knife, and fell on his knees in his
cell, naked, and weltering in his blood. On entering, he was found in
this posture. “Good God! brother, what have you done? Who has treated
you thus?” He replied, very calmly, “Father, I am doing penance.” He
fainted away; he was put to bed; his wounds, which were found very
dangerous, were dressed; with uncommon care and attention he recovered
at the end of three months, and was sent back to his friends.
If you do not think such a head sufficiently disordered, tell me
so, and you shall have the story of Madame Paul,[66] who is fallen
desperately in love with a great booby of five or six and twenty, whom
she had taken to be her gardener. The lady has managed her affairs
admirably; she has married him. The fellow is a mere brute, and has
not common sense; he will beat her soon, he has already threatened to
do it; no matter, she was resolved to have him. I have never seen such
violent love; there is all the extravagance of sentiments imaginable,
were they but rightly applied; but they are like a rough sketch of
an ill painting; all the colors are there, they want only to be
properly disposed. It is extremely amusing to me to meditate on the
caprices of love. I feel frightened for myself when I see such things!
What insolence, to attack Mme. Paul--that is to say, austere, old,
straight-laced virtue herself!
[66] Widow to the gardener at Livri.