But it had a grand fault. It described a course which, if followed,

would have ruined an army of financiers, of clerks, of functionaries of

all kinds; it would have forced them to live at their own expense,

instead of at the expense of the people; and it would have sapped the

foundations of those immense fortunes that are seen to grow up in such a

short time. This was enough to cause its failure.

All the people interested in opposing the work set up a cry. They saw

place, power, everything, about to fly from their grasp, if the counsels

of Vauban were acted upon. What wonder, then, that the King, who was

surrounded by these people, listened to their reasons, and received with

a very ill grace Marechal Vauban when he presented his book to him. The

ministers, it may well be believed, did not give him a better welcome.

From that moment his services, his military capacity (unique of its

kind), his virtues, the affection the King had had for him, all were

forgotten. The King saw only in Marechal Vauban a man led astray by love

for the people, a criminal who attacked the authority of the ministers,

and consequently that of the King. He explained himself to this effect

without scruple.

The unhappy Marechal could not survive the loss of his royal master’s

favour, or stand up against the enmity the King’s explanations had

created against him; he died a few months after consumed with grief, and

with an affliction nothing could soften, and to which the King was

insensible to such a point, that he made semblance of not perceiving that

he had lost a servitor so useful and so illustrious. Vauban, justly

celebrated over all Europe, was regretted in France by all who were not

financiers or their supporters.

Boisguilbert, whom this event ought to have rendered wise, could not

contain himself. One of the objections which had been urged against his

theories, was the difficulty of carrying out changes in the midst of a

great war. He now published a book refuting this point, and describing

such a number of abuses then existing, to abolish which, he asked, was it

necessary to wait for peace, that the ministers were outraged.

Boisguilbert was exiled to Auvergne. I did all in my power to revoke

this sentence, having known Boisguilbert at Rouen, but did not succeed

until the end of two months. He was then allowed to return to Rouen, but

was severely reprimanded, and stripped of his functions for some little

time. He was amply indemnified, however, for this by the crowd of

people, and the acclamations with which he was received.

It is due to Chamillart to say, that he was the only minister who had

listened with any attention to these new systems of Vauban and

Boisguilbert. He indeed made trial of the plans suggested by the former,

but the circumstances were not favourable to his success, and they of

course failed. Some time after, instead of following the system of

Vauban, and reducing the imposts, fresh ones were added. Who would have

said to the Marechal that all his labours for the relief of the people of

France would lead to new imposts, more harsh, more permanent, and more

heavy than he protested against? It is a terrible lesson against all

improvements in matters of taxation and finance.

But it is time, now, that I should retrace my steps to other matters,

which, if related in due order of time, should have found a place ere

this. And first, let me relate the particulars concerning a trial in

which I was engaged, and which I have deferred allusion to until now, so

as not to entangle the thread of my narrative.

My sister, as I have said in its proper place, had married the Duc de

Brissac, and the marriage had not been a happy one. After a time, in

fact, they separated. My sister at her death left me her universal

legatee; and shortly after this, M. de Brissac brought an action against

me on her account for five hundred thousand francs. After his death, his

representatives continued the action, which I resisted, not only

maintaining that I owed none of the five hundred thousand francs, but

claiming to have two hundred thousand owing to me, out of six hundred

thousand which had formed the dowry of my sister.

When M. de Brissac died, there seemed some probability that his peerage

would become extinct; for the Comte de Cosse, who claimed to succeed him,

was opposed by a number of peers, and but for me might have failed to

establish his pretensions. I, however, as his claim was just, interested

myself in him, supported him with all my influence, and gained for him

the support of several influential peers: so that in the end he was

recognised as Duc de Brissac, and received as such at the parliament on

the 6th of May, 1700.

Having succeeded thus to the titles and estates of his predecessor, he

succeeded also to his liabilities, debts, and engagements. Among these

was the trial against me for five hundred thousand francs. Cosse felt so

thoroughly that he owed his rank to me, that he offered to give me five

hundred thousand francs, so as to indemnify me against an adverse

decision in the cause. Now, as I have said, I not only resisted this

demand made upon me for five hundred thousand francs, but I, in my turn,

claimed two hundred thousand francs, and my claim, once admitted, all the

personal creditors of the late Duc de Brissac (creditors who, of course,

had to be paid by the new Duke) would have been forced to stand aside

until my debt was settled.

I, therefore, refused this offer of Cosse, lest other creditors should

hear of the arrangement, and force him to make a similar one with them.

He was overwhelmed with a generosity so little expected, and we became

more intimately connected from that day.

Cosse, once received as Duc de Brissac, I no longer feared to push

forward the action I had commenced for the recovery of the two hundred

thousand francs due to me, and which I had interrupted only on his

account. I had gained it twice running against the late Duc de Brissac,

at the parliament of Rouen; but the Duchesse d’Aumont, who in the last

years of his life had lent him money, and whose debt was in danger,

succeeded in getting this cause sent up for appeal to the parliament at

Paris, where she threw obstacle upon obstacle in its path, and caused

judgment to be delayed month after month. When I came to take active

steps in the matter, my surprise--to use no stronger word--was great, to

find Cosse, after all I had done for him, favouring the pretensions of

the Duchesse d’Aumont, and lending her his aid to establish them.

However, he and the Duchesse d’Aumont lost their cause, for when it was

submitted to the judges of the council at Paris, it was sent back to

Rouen, and they had to pay damages and expenses.

For years the affair had been ready to be judged at Rouen, but M.

d’Aumont every year, by means of his letters of state, obtained a

postponement. At last, however, M. d’Aumont died, and I was assured that

the letters of state should not be again produced, and that in

consequence no further adjournment should take place. I and Madame de

Saint-Simon at once set out, therefore, for Rouen, where we were

exceedingly well received, fetes and entertainments being continually

given in our honour.

After we had been there but eight or ten days, I received a letter from

Pontchartrain, who sent me word that the King had learnt with surprise I

was at Rouen, and had charged him to ask me why I was there: so attentive

was the King as to what became of the people of mark, he was accustomed

to see around him! My reply was not difficult.

Meanwhile our cause proceeded. The parliament, that is to say, the Grand

Chamber, suspended all other business in order to finish ours. The

affair was already far advanced, when it was interrupted by an obstacle,

of all obstacles the least possible to foresee. The letters of state had

again been put in, for the purpose of obtaining another adjournment.

My design is not to weary by recitals, which interest only myself; but I

must explain this matter fully. It was Monday evening. The parliament

of Rouen ended on the following Saturday. If we waited until the opening

of the next parliament, we should have to begin our cause from the

beginning, and with new presidents and judges, who would know nothing of

the facts. What was to be done? To appeal to the King seemed

impossible, for he was at Marly, and, while there, never listened to such

matters. By the time he left Marly, it would be too late to apply to

him.

Madame de Saint-Simon and others advised me, however, at all hazards, to

go straight to the King, instead of sending a courier, as I thought of

doing, and to keep my journey secret. I followed their advice, and

setting out at once, arrived at Marly on Tuesday morning, the 8th of

August, at eight of the clock. The Chancellor and Chamillart, to whom I

told my errand, pitied me, but gave me no hope of success. Nevertheless,

a council of state was to be held on the following morning, presided over

by the King, and my petition was laid before it. The letters of state

were thrown out by every voice. This information was brought to me at

mid-day. I partook of a hasty dinner, and turned back to Rouen, where I

arrived on Thursday, at eight o’clock in the morning, three hours after a

courier, by whom I had sent this unhoped-for news.

I brought with me, besides the order respecting the letters of state, an

order to the parliament to proceed to judgment at once. It was laid

before the judges very early on Saturday, the 11th of August, the last

day of the parliament. From four o’clock in the morning we had an

infinite number of visitors, wanting to accompany us to the palace. The

parliament had been much irritated against these letters of state, after

having suspended all other business for us. The withdrawal of these

letters was now announced. We gained our cause, with penalties and

expenses, amid acclamations which resounded through the court, and which

followed us into the streets. We could scarcely enter our street, so

full was it with the crowd, or our house, which was equally crowded. Our

kitchen chimney soon after took fire, and it was only a marvel that it

was extinguished, without damage, after having strongly warned us, and

turned our joy into bitterness. There was only the master of the house

who was unmoved. We dined, however, with a grand company; and after

stopping one or two days more to thank our friends, we went to see the

sea at Dieppe, and then to Cani, to a beautiful house belonging to our

host at Rouen.

As for Madame d’Aumont, she was furious at the ill-success of her affair.

It was she who had obtained the letters of state from the steward of her

son-in-law. Her son-in-law had promised me that they should not be used,

and wrote at once to say he had had no hand in their production. M. de

Brissac, who had been afraid to look me in the face ever since he had

taken part in this matter, and with whom I had openly broken, was now so

much ashamed that he avoided me everywhere.

CHAPTER XXXVII

It was just at the commencement of the year 1706, that I received a piece

of news which almost took away my breath by its suddenness, and by the

surprise it caused me. I was on very intimate terms with Gualterio, the

nuncio of the Pope. Just about this time we were without an ambassador

at Rome. The nuncio spoke to me about this post; but at my age--I was

but thirty--and knowing the unwillingness of the King to employ young men

in public affairs, I paid no attention to his words. Eight days

afterwards he entered my chamber-one Tuesday, about an hour after mid-

day-his arms open, joy painted upon his face, and embracing me, told me

to shut my door, and even that of my antechamber, so that he should not

be seen. I was to go to Rome as ambassador. I made him repeat this

twice over: it seemed so impossible. If one of the portraits in my

chamber had spoken to me, I could not have been more surprised.

Gualterio begged me to keep the matter secret, saying, that the

appointment would be officially announced to me ere long.

I went immediately and sought out Chamillart, reproaching him for not

having apprised me of this good news. He smiled at my anger, and said

that the King had ordered the news to be kept secret. I admit that I was

flattered at being chosen at my age for an embassy so important. I was

advised on every side to accept it, and this I determined to do. I could

not understand, however, how it was I had been selected. Torcy, years

afterwards, when the King was dead, related to me how it came about. At

this time I had no relations with Torcy; it was not until long afterwards

that friendship grew up between us.

He said, then, that the embassy being vacant, the King wished to fill up

that appointment, and wished also that a Duke should be ambassador. He

took an almanack and began reading the names of the Dukes, commencing

with M. de Uzes. He made no stop until he came to my name. Then he said

(to Torcy), “What do you think of him? He is young, but he is good,” &c.

The King, after hearing a few opinions expressed by those around him,

shut up the almanack, and said it was not worth while to go farther,

determined that I should be ambassador, but ordered the appointment to be

kept secret. I learnt this, more than ten years after its occurrence,

from a true man, who had no longer any interest or reason to disguise

anything from me.

Advised on all sides by my friends to accept the post offered to me, I

did not long hesitate to do so. Madame de Saint-Simon gave me the same

advice, although she herself was pained at the idea of quitting her

family. I cannot refuse myself the pleasure of relating here what the

three ministers each said of my wife, a woman then of only twenty-seven

years of age. All three, unknown to each other, and without solicitation

on my part, counselled me to keep none of the affairs of my embassy

secret from her, but to give her a place at the end of the table when I

read or wrote my despatches, and to consult her with deference upon

everything. I have rarely so much relished advice as I did in this case.

Although, as things fell out, I could not follow it at Rome, I had

followed it long before, and continued to do so all my life. I kept

nothing secret from her, and I had good reason to be pleased that I did

not. Her counsel was always wise, judicious, and useful, and oftentimes

she warded off from me many inconveniences.

But to continue the narrative of this embassy. It was soon so generally

known that I was going to Rome, that as we danced at Marly, we heard

people say, “Look! M. l’Ambassadeur and Madame l’Ambassadrice are

dancing.” After this I wished the announcement to be made public as soon

as possible, but the King was not to be hurried. Day after day passed

by, and still I was kept in suspense. At last, about the middle of

April, I had an interview with Chamillart one day, just after he came out

of the council at which I knew my fate had been decided. I learnt then

that the King had determined to send no ambassador to Rome. The Abbe de

La Tremoille was already there; he had been made Cardinal, and was to

remain and attend to the affairs of the embassy. I found out afterwards

that I had reason to attribute to Madame de Maintenon and M. du Maine the

change in the King’s intention towards me. Madame de Saint-Simon was

delighted. It seemed as though she foresaw the strange discredit in

which the affairs of the King were going to fall in Italy, the

embarrassment and the disorder that public misfortunes would cause the

finances, and the cruel situation to which all things would have reduced

us at Rome. As for me, I had had so much leisure to console myself

beforehand, that I had need of no more. I felt, however, that I had now

lost all favour with the King, and, indeed, he estranged himself from me

more and more each day. By what means I recovered myself it is not yet

time to tell.

On the night between the 3rd and 4th of February, Cardinal Coislin,

Bishop of Orleans, died. He was a little man, very fat, who looked like

a village curate. His purity of manners and his virtues caused him to be

much loved. Two good actions of his life deserve to be remembered.

When, after the revocation of the edict of Nantes, the King determined to

convert the Huguenots by means of dragoons and torture, a regiment was

sent to Orleans, to be spread abroad in the diocese. As soon as it

arrived, M. d’Orleans sent word to the officers that they might make his

house their home; that their horses should be lodged in his stables. He

begged them not to allow a single one of their men to leave the town, to

make the slightest disorder; to say no word to the Huguenots, and not to

lodge in their houses. He resolved to be obeyed, and he was. The

regiment stayed a month; and cost him a good deal. At the end of that

time he so managed matters that the soldiers were sent away, and none

came again. This conduct, so full of charity, so opposed to that of

nearly all the other dioceses, gained as many Huguenots as were gained by

the barbarities they suffered elsewhere. It needed some courage, to say

nothing of generosity, to act thus, and to silently blame, as it were,

the conduct of the King.

The other action of M. d’Orleans was less public and less dangerous,

but was not less good. He secretly gave away many alms to the poor,

in addition to those he gave publicly. Among those whom he succoured

was a poor, broken-down gentleman, without wife or child, to whom he gave

four hundred livres of pension, and a place at his table whenever he was

at Orleans. One morning the servants of M. d’Orleans told their master

that ten pieces of plate were missing, and that suspicion fell upon the

gentleman. M. d’Orleans could not believe him guilty, but as he did not

make his appearance at the house for several days, was forced at last to

imagine he was so. Upon this he sent for the gentleman, who admitted

himself to be the offender.

M. d’Orleans said he must have been strangely pressed to commit an action

of this nature, and reproached him for not having mentioned his wants.

Then, drawing twenty Louis from his pocket, he gave them to the

gentleman, told him to forget what had occurred, and to use his table

as before. M. d’Orleans prohibited his servants to mention their

suspicions, and this anecdote would never have been known, had it not

been told by the gentleman himself, penetrated with confusion and

gratitude.

M. d’Orleans, after he became cardinal, was often pressed by his friends

to give up his bishopric. But this he would not listen to. The King had

for him a respect that was almost devotion. When Madame de Bourgogne was

about to be delivered of her first child, the King sent a courier to M.

d’Orleans requesting him to come to Court immediately, and to remain

there until after the delivery. When the child was born, the King would

not allow it to be sprinkled by any other hand than that of M. d’Orleans.

The poor man, very fat, as I have said, always sweated very much;--on

this occasion, wrapped up in his cloak and his lawn, his body ran with

sweat in such abundance, that in the antechamber the floor was wet all

round where he stood. All the Court was much afflicted at his death; the

King more than anybody spoke his praises. It was known after his death,

from his valet de chambre, that he mortified himself continually with

instruments of penitence, and that he rose every night and passed an hour

on his knees in prayer. He received the sacraments with great piety, and

died the night following as he had lived.

Heudicourt the younger, a species of very mischievous satyr, and much

mixed up in grand intrigues of gallantry, made, about this time, a song

upon the grand ‘prevot’ and his family. It was so simple, so true to

nature, withal so pleasant, that some one having whispered it in the ear

of the Marechal de Boufflers at chapel, he could not refrain from

bursting into laughter, although he was in attendance at the mass of the

King. The Marechal was the gravest and most serious man in all France;

the greatest slave to decorum. The King turned round therefore, in

surprise, which augmented considerably when he saw the Marechal de

Boufflers nigh to bursting with laughter, and the tears running down his

cheeks. On turning into his cabinet, he called the Marechal, and asked

what had got him in that state at the mass. The Marechal repeated the

song to him. Thereupon the King burst out louder than the Marechal had,

and for a whole fortnight afterwards could not help smiling whenever he

saw the grand ‘prevot’ or any of his family. The song soon spread about,

and much diverted the Court and the town.

I should particularly avoid soiling this page with an account of the

operation for fistula which Courcillon, only son of Dangeau, had

performed upon him, but for the extreme ridicule with which it was

accompanied. Courcillon was a dashing young fellow, much given to witty

sayings, to mischief, to impiety, and to the filthiest debauchery, of

which latter, indeed, this operation passed publicly as the fruit. His

mother, Madams Dangeau, was in the strictest intimacy with Madame de

Maintenon. They two alone, of all the Court, were ignorant of the life

Courcillon led. Madame was much afflicted; and quitted his bed-side,

even for a moment, with pain. Madame de Maintenon entered into her

sorrow, and went every day to bear her company at the pillow of

Courcillon. Madame d’Heudicourt, another intimate friend of Madame de

Maintenon, was admitted there also, but scarcely anybody else.

Courcillon listened to them, spoke devotionally to them, and uttered the

reflections suggested by his state. They, all admiration, published

everywhere that he was a saint. Madame d’Heudicourt and a few others who

listened to these discourses, and who knew the pilgrim well, and saw him

loll out his tongue at them on the sly, knew not what to do to prevent

their laughter, and as soon as they could get away went and related all

they had heard to their friends. Courcillon, who thought it a mighty

honour to have Madame de Maintenon every day for nurse, but who,

nevertheless, was dying of weariness, used to see his friends in the

evening (when Madame de Maintenon and his mother were gone), and would

relate to them, with burlesque exaggeration, all the miseries he had

suffered during the day, and ridicule the devotional discourses he had

listened to. All the time his illness lasted, Madame de Maintenon came

every day to see him, so that her credulity, which no one dared to

enlighten, was the laughing-stock of the Court. She conceived such a

high opinion of the virtue of Courcillon, that she cited him always as an

example, and the King also formed the same opinion. Courcillon took good

care not to try and cultivate it when he became cured; yet neither the

King nor Madame de Maintenon opened their eyes, or changed their conduct

towards him. Madame de Maintenon, it must be said, except in the sublime

intrigue of her government and with the King, was always the queen of

dupes.

It would seem that there are, at certain times, fashions in crimes as in

clothes. At the period of the Voysins and the Brinvilliers, there were

nothing but poisoners abroad; and against these, a court was expressly

instituted, called ardente, because it condemned them to the flames. At

the time of which I am now speaking, 1703, for I forgot to relate what

follows in its proper place, forgers of writings were in the ascendant,

and became so common, that a chamber was established composed of

councillors of state and others, solely to judge the accusations which

this sort of criminals gave rise to.

The Bouillons wished to be recognised as descended, by male issue, of the

Counts of Auvergne, and to claim all kinds of distinctions and honours in

consequence. They had, however, no proofs of this, but, on the contrary,

their genealogy proved it to be false. All on a sudden, an old document

that had been interred in the obscurity of ages in the church of Brioude,

was presented to Cardinal Bouillon. It had all the marks of antiquity,

and contained a triumphant proof of the descent of the house of La Tour,

to which the Bouillons belonged, from the ancient Counts of Auvergne.

The Cardinal was delighted to have in his hands this precious document.

But to avoid all suspicion, he affected modesty, and hesitated to give

faith to evidence so decisive. He spoke in confidence to all the learned

men he knew, and begged them to examine the document with care, so that

he might not be the dupe of a too easy belief in it.

Whether the examiners were deceived by the document, or whether they

allowed themselves to be seduced into believing it, as is more than

probable, from fear of giving offence to the Cardinal, need not be

discussed. It is enough to say that they pronounced in favour of the

deed, and that Father Mabillon, that Benedictine so well known throughout

all Europe by his sense and his candour, was led by the others to share

their opinion.

After this, Cardinal de Bouillon no longer affected any doubt about the

authenticity of the discovery. All his friends complimented him upon it,

the majority to see how he would receive their congratulations. It was a

chaos rather than a mixture, of vanity the most outrageous, modesty the

most affected, and joy the most immoderate which he could not restrain.

Unfortunately, De Bar, who had found the precious document, and who had

presented it to Cardinal de Bouillon, was arrested and put in prison a

short time after this, charged with many forgeries. This event made some

stir, and caused suspicion to fall upon the document, which was now

attentively examined through many new spectacles. Learned men

unacquainted with the Bouillons contested it, and De Bar was so pushed

upon this point, that he made many delicate admissions. Alarm at once

spread among the Bouillons. They did all in their power to ward off the

blow that was about to fall. Seeing the tribunal firm, and fully

resolved to follow the affair to the end, they openly solicited for De

Bar, and employed all their credit to gain his liberation. At last,

finding the tribunal inflexible, they were reduced to take an extreme

resolution. M. de Bouillon admitted to the King, that his brother,

Cardinal de Bouillon, might, unknown to all of them, have brought forward

facts he could not prove. He added, that putting himself in the King’s

hands, he begged that the affair might be stopped at once, out of

consideration for those whose only guilt was too great credulity, and too

much confidence in a brother who had deceived them. The King, with more

of friendship for M. de Bouillon than of reflection as to what he owed by

way of reparation for a public offence, agreed to this course.

De Bar, convicted of having fabricated this document, by his own

admission before the public tribunal, was not condemned to death, but to

perpetual imprisonment. As may be believed, this adventure made a great

stir; but what cannot be believed so easily is, the conduct of the

Messieurs Bouillon about fifteen months afterwards.

At the time when the false document above referred to was discovered,

Cardinal de Bouillon had commissioned Baluze, a man much given to

genealogical studies, to write the history of the house of Auvergne.

In this history, the descent, by male issue; of the Bouillons from the

Counts of Auvergne, was established upon the evidence supplied by this

document. At least, nobody doubted that such was the case, and the world

was strangely scandalised to see the work appear after that document had

been pronounced to be a forgery. Many learned men and friends of Baluze

considered him so dishonoured by it, that they broke off all relations

with him, and this put the finishing touch to the confusion of this

affair.

On Thursday, the 7th of March, 1707, a strange event troubled the King,

and filled the Court and the town with rumours. Beringhen, first master

of the horse, left Versailles at seven o’clock in the evening of that

day, to go to Paris, alone in one of the King’s coaches, two of the royal

footmen behind, and a groom carrying a torch before him on the seventh

horse. The carriage had reached the plain of Bissancourt, and was

passing between a farm on the road near Sevres bridge and a cabaret,

called the “Dawn of Day,” when it was stopped by fifteen or sixteen men

on horseback, who seized on Beringhen, hurried him into a post-chaise in

waiting, and drove off with him. The King’s carriage, with the coachman,

footmen, and groom, was allowed to go back to Versailles. As soon as it

reached Versailles the King was informed of what had taken place. He

sent immediately to his four Secretaries of State, ordering them to send

couriers everywhere to the frontiers, with instructions to the governors

to guard all the passages, so that if these horsemen were foreign

enemies, as was suspected, they would be caught in attempting to pass out

of the kingdom. It was known that a party of the enemy had entered

Artois, that they had committed no disorders, but that they were there

still. Although people found it difficult, at first, to believe that

Beringhen had been carried off by a party such as this, yet as it was

known that he had no enemies, that he was not reputed sufficiently rich

to afford hope of a large ransom, and that not one of our wealthiest

financiers had been seized in this manner, this explanation was at last

accepted as the right one.

So in fact it proved. A certain Guetem, a fiddler of the Elector of

Bavaria, had entered the service of Holland, had taken part in her war

against France, and had become a colonel. Chatting one evening with his

comrades, he laid a wager that he would carry off some one of mark

between Paris and Versailles. He obtained a passport, and thirty chosen

men, nearly all of whom were officers. They passed the rivers disguised

as traders, by which means they were enabled to post their relays [of

horses]. Several of them had remained seven or eight days at Sevres,

Saint Cloud, and Boulogne, from which they had the hardihood to go to

Versailles and see the King sup. One of these was caught on the day

after the disappearance of Beringhen, and when interrogated by

Chamillart, replied with a tolerable amount of impudence. Another was

caught in the forest of Chantilly by one of the servants of M. le Prince.

From him it became known that relays of horses and a post-chaise had been

provided at Morliere for the prisoner when he should arrive there, and

that he had already passed the Oise.

As I have said, couriers were despatched to the governors of the

frontiers; in addition to this, information of what had taken place was

sent to all the intendants of the frontier, to all the troops in quarters

there. Several of the King’s guards, too, and the grooms of the stable,

went in pursuit of the captors of Beringhen. Notwithstanding the

diligence used, the horsemen had traversed the Somme and had gone four

leagues beyond Ham-Beringhen, guarded by the officers, and pledged to

offer no resistance--when the party was stopped by a quartermaster and

two detachments of the Livry regiment. Beringhen was at once set at

liberty. Guetem and his companion were made prisoners.

The grand fault they had committed was to allow the King’s carriage and

the footmen to go back to Versailles so soon after the abduction. Had

they led away the coach under cover of the night, and so kept the King in

ignorance of their doings until the next day, they would have had more

time for their retreat. Instead of doing this they fatigued themselves

by too much haste. They had grown tired of waiting for a carriage that

seemed likely to contain somebody of mark. The Chancellor had passed,

but in broad daylight, and they were afraid in consequence to stop him.

M. le Duc d’Orleans had passed, but in a post-chaise, which they

mistrusted. At last Beringhen appeared in one of the King’s coaches,

attended by servants in the King’s livery, and wearing his cordon Neu, as

was his custom. They thought they had found a prize indeed. They soon

learnt with whom they had to deal, and told him also who they were.

Guetem bestowed upon Beringhen all kinds of attention, and testified a

great desire to spare him as much as possible all fatigue. He pushed his

attentions so far that they caused his failure. He allowed Beringhen to

stop and rest on two occasions. The party missed one of their relays,

and that delayed them very much.

Beringhen, delighted with his rescue, and very grateful for the good

treatment he had received, changed places with Guetem and his companions,

led them to Ham, and in his turn treated them well. He wrote to his wife

and to Charnillart announcing his release, and these letters were read

with much satisfaction by the King.

On Tuesday, the 29th of March, Beringhen arrived at Versailles, about

eight o’clock in the evening, and went at once to the King, who was in

the apartments of Madame de Maintenon, and who received him well, and

made him relate all his adventures. But the King was not pleased when he

found the officers of the stable in a state of great delight, and

preparing fireworks to welcome Beringhen back. He prohibited all these

marks of rejoicing, and would not allow the fireworks to be let off. He

had these little jealousies. He wished that all should be devoted to him

alone, without reserve and without division. All the Court, however,

showed interest in this return, and Beringhen was consoled by the public

welcome he received for his fatigue.

Guetem and his officers, while waiting the pleasure of the King, were

lodged in Beringhen’s house in Paris, where they were treated above their

deserts. Beringhen obtained permission for Guetem to see the King. He

did more; he presented Guetem to the King, who praised him for having so

well treated his prisoner, and said that war always ought to be conducted

properly. Guetem, who was not without wit, replied, that he was so

astonished to find himself before the greatest King in the world, and to

find that King doing him the honour of speaking to him, that he had not

power enough to answer. He remained ten or twelve days in Beringhen’s

house to see Paris, the Opera and the Comedy, and became the talk of the

town. People ran after him everywhere, and the most distinguished were

not ashamed to do likewise. On all sides he was applauded for an act of

temerity, which might have passed for insolence. Beringhen regaled him,

furnished him with carriages and servants to accompany him, and, at

parting, with money and considerable presents. Guetem went on his parole

to Rheims to rejoin his comrades until exchanged, and had the town for

prison. Nearly all the others had escaped. The project was nothing less

than to carry off Monseigneur, or one of the princes, his sons.

This ridiculous adventure gave rise to precautions, excessive in the

first place, and which caused sad obstructions of bridges and gates. It

caused, too, a number of people to be arrested. The hunting parties of

the princes were for some time interfered with, until matters resumed

their usual course. But it was not bad fun to see, during some time, the

terror of ladies, and even of men, of the Court, who no longer dared go

abroad except in broad daylight, even then with little assurance, and

imagining themselves everywhere in marvellous danger of capture.

I have related in its proper place the adventure of Madame la Princesse

de Conti with Mademoiselle Choin and the attachment of Monseigneur for

the latter. This attachment was only augmented by the difficulty of

seeing each other.

Mademoiselle Choin retired to the house of Lacroix, one of her relatives

at Paris, where she lived quite hidden. She was informed of the rare

days when Monseigneur dined alone at Meudon, without sleeping there. She

went there the day before in a fiacre, passed through the courts on foot,

ill clad, like a common sort of woman going to see some officer at

Meudon, and, by a back staircase, was admitted to Monseigneur who passed

some hours with her in a little apartment on the first floor. In time

she came there with a lady’s-maid, her parcel in her pocket, on the

evenings of the days that Monseigneur slept there.

She remained in this apartment without seeing anybody, attended by her

lady’s-maid, and waited upon by a servant who alone was in the secret.

Little by little the friends of Monseigneur were allowed to see her;

and amongst these were M. le Prince de Conti, Monseigneur le Duc de

Bourgogne, Madame la Duchesse de Bourgogne, and M. le Duc de Berry.

There was always, however, an air of mystery about the matter. The

parties that took place were kept secret, although frequent, and were

called parvulos.

Mademoiselle Choin remained in her little apartment only for the

convenience of Monseigneur. She slept in the bed and in the grand

apartment where Madame la Duchesse de Bourgogne lodged when the King was

at Meudon. She always sat in an arm-chair before Monseigneur; Madame de

Bourgogne sat on a stool. Mademoiselle Choin never rose for her; in

speaking of her, even before Monseigneur and the company, she used to say

“the Duchesse de Bourgogne,” and lived with her as Madame de Maintenon

did excepting that “darling” and “my aunt,” were terms not exchanged

between them, and that Madame de Bourgogne was not nearly so free, or so

much at her ease, as with the King and Madame de Maintenon. Monsieur de

Bourgogne was much in restraint. His manners did not agree with those of

that world. Monseigneur le Duc de Berry, who was more free, was quite at

home.

Mademoiselle Choin went on fete-days to hear mass in the chapel at six

o’clock in the morning, well wrapped up, and took her meals alone, when

Monseigneur did not eat with her. When he was alone with her, the doors

were all guarded and barricaded to keep out intruders. People regarded

her as being to Monseigneur, what Madame de Maintenon was to the King.

All the batteries for the future were directed and pointed towards her.

People schemed to gain permission to visit her at Paris; people paid

court to her friends and acquaintances, Monseigneur le Duc de Bourgogne

sought to please her, was respectful to her, attentive to her friends,

not always with success. She acted towards Monseigneur le Duc de

Bourgogne like a mother-in-law, and sometimes spoke with such authority

and bluntness to Madame de Bourgogne as to make her cry.

The King and Madame de Maintenon were in no way ignorant of all this, but

they held their tongues, and all the Court who knew it, spoke only in

whispers of it. This is enough for the present; it will serve to explain

many things, of which I shall speak anon.

CHAPTER XXXVIII

On Wednesday, the 27th of May, 1707, at three o’clock in the morning,

Madame de Montespan, aged sixty, died very suddenly at the waters of

Bourbon. Her death made much stir, although she had long retired from

the Court and from the world, and preserved no trace of the commanding

influence she had so long possessed. I need not go back beyond my own

experience, and to the time of her reign as mistress of the King. I will

simply say, because the anecdote is little known, that her conduct was

more the fault of her husband than her own. She warned him as soon as

she suspected the King to be in love with her; and told him when there

was no longer any doubt upon her mind. She assured him that a great

entertainment that the King gave was in her honour. She pressed him,

she entreated him in the most eloquent manner, to take her away to his

estates of Guyenne, and leave her there until the King had forgotten her

or chosen another mistress. It was all to no purpose; and Montespan was

not long before repentance seized him; for his torment was that he loved

her all his life, and died still in love with her--although he would

never consent to see her again after the first scandal.

Nor will I speak of the divers degrees which the fear of the devil at

various times put to her separation from the Court; and I will elsewhere

speak of Madame de Maintenon, who owed her everything, who fed her on

serpents, and who at last ousted her from the Court. What no one dared

to say, what the King himself dared not, M. du Maine, her son, dared.

M. de Meaux (Bossuet) did the rest. She went in tears and fury, and

never forgave M. du Maine, who by his strange service gained over for

ever to his interests the heart and the mighty influence of Madame de

Maintenon.

The mistress, retired amongst the Community of Saint Joseph, which she

had built, was long in accustoming herself to it. She carried about her

idleness and unhappiness to Bourbon, to Fontevrault, to D’Antin; she was

many years without succeeding in obtaining mastery over herself. At last

God touched her. Her sin had never been accompanied by forgetfulness;

she used often to leave the King to go and pray in her cabinet; nothing

could ever make her evade any fast day or meagre day; her austerity in

fasting continued amidst all her dissipation. She gave alms, was

esteemed by good people, never gave way to doubt of impiety; but she was

imperious, haughty and overbearing, full of mockery, and of all the

qualities by which beauty with the power it bestows is naturally

accompanied. Being resolved at last to take advantage of an opportunity

which had been given her against her will, she put herself in the hands

of Pere de la Tour, that famous General of the Oratory. From that moment

to the time of her death her conversion continued steadily, and her

penitence augmented. She had first to get rid of the secret fondness she

still entertained for the Court, even of the hopes which, however

chimerical, had always flattered her. She was persuaded that nothing but

the fear of the devil had forced the King to separate himself from her,

that it was nothing but this fear that had raised Madame de Maintenon to

the height she had attained; that age and ill-health, which she was

pleased to imagine, would soon clear the way; that when the King was a

widower, she being a widow, nothing would oppose their reunion, which

might easily be brought about by their affection for their children.

These children entertained similar hopes, and were therefore assiduous in

their attention to her for some time.

Pere de la Tour made her perform a terrible act of penitence. It was to

ask pardon of her husband, and to submit herself to his commands. To all

who knew Madame de Montespan this will seem the most heroic sacrifice.

M. de Montespan, however, imposed no restraint upon his wife. He sent

word that he wished in no way to interfere with her, or even to see her.

She experienced no further trouble, therefore, on this score.

Little by little she gave almost all she had to the poor. She worked for

them several hours a day, making stout shirts and such things for them.

Her table, that she had loved to excess, became the most frugal; her

fasts multiplied; she would interrupt her meals in order to go and pray.

Her mortifications were continued; her chemises and her sheets were of

rough linen, of the hardest and thickest kind, but hidden under others of

ordinary kind. She unceasingly wore bracelets, garters, and a girdle,

all armed with iron points, which oftentimes inflicted wounds upon her;

and her tongue, formerly so dangerous, had also its peculiar penance

imposed on it. She was, moreover, so tormented with the fear of death,

that she employed several women, whose sole occupation was to watch her.

She went to sleep with all the curtains of her bed open, many lights in

her chamber, and her women around her. Whenever she awoke she wished to

find them chatting, playing, or enjoying themselves, so as to re-assure

herself against their drowsiness.

With all this she could never throw off the manners of a queen. She had

an arm-chair in her chamber with its back turned to the foot of the bed.

There was no other in the chamber, not even when her natural children

came to see her, not even for Madame la Duchesse d’Orleans. She was

oftentimes visited by the most distinguished people of the Court, and she

spoke like a queen to all. She treated everybody with much respect, and

was treated so in turn. I have mentioned in its proper place, that a

short time before her death, the King gave her a hundred thousand francs

to buy an estate; but this present was not gratis, for she had to send

back a necklace worth a hundred and fifty thousand, to which the King

made additions, and bestowed it on the Duchesse de Bourgogne.

The last time Madame de Montespan went to Bourbon she paid all her

charitable pensions and gratuities two years in advance and doubled her

alms. Although in good health she had a presentiment that she should

return no more. This presentiment, in effect, proved correct. She felt

herself so ill one night, although she had been very well just before,

that she confessed herself, and received the sacrament. Previous to this

she called all her servants into her room and made a public confession of

her public sins, asking pardon for the scandal she had caused with a

humility so decent, so profound, so penitent, that nothing could be more

edifying. She received the last sacrament with an ardent piety. The

fear of death which all her life had so continually troubled her,

disappeared suddenly, and disturbed her no more. She died, without

regret, occupied only with thoughts of eternity, and with a sweetness and

tranquillity that accompanied all her actions.

Her only son by Monsieur de Montespan, whom she had treated like a

mother-in-law, until her separation from the King, but who had since

returned to her affection, D’Antin, arrived just before her death. She

looked at him, and only said that he saw her in a very different state to

what he had seen her at Bellegarde. As soon as she was dead he set out

for Paris, leaving orders for her obsequies, which were strange, or were

strangely executed. Her body, formerly so perfect, became the prey of

the unskilfulness and the ignorance of a surgeon. The obsequies were at

the discretion of the commonest valets, all the rest of the house having

suddenly deserted. The body remained a long time at the door of the

house, whilst the canons of the Sainte Chapelle and the priests of the

parish disputed about the order of precedence with more than indecency.

It was put in keeping under care of the parish, like the corpse of the

meanest citizen of the place, and not until a long time afterwards was it

sent to Poitiers to be placed in the family tomb, and then with an

unworthy parsimony. Madame de Montespan was bitterly regretted by all

the poor of the province, amongst whom she spread an infinity of alms, as

well as amongst others of different degree.

As for the King, his perfect insensibility at the death of a mistress he

had so passionately loved, and for so many years, was so extreme, that

Madame de Bourgogne could not keep her surprise from him. He replied,

tranquilly, that since he had dismissed her he had reckoned upon never

seeing her again, and that thus she was from that time dead to him. It

is easy to believe that the grief of the children he had had by her did

not please him. Those children did not dare to wear mourning for a

mother not recognised. Their appearance, therefore, contrasted with that

of the children of Madame de la Valliere, who had just died, and for whom

they were wearing mourning. Nothing could equal the grief which Madame

la Duchesse d’Orleans, Madame la Duchesse, and the Comte de Toulouse

exhibited. The grief of Madame la Duchesse especially was astonishing,

for she always prided herself on loving nobody; still more astonishing

was the grief of M. le Duc, so inaccessible to friendship. We must

remember, however, that this death put an end to many hopes. M. du

Maine, for his part, could scarcely repress his joy at the death of his

mother, and after having stopped away from Marly two days, returned and

caused the Comte de Toulouse to be recalled likewise. Madame de

Maintenon, delivered of a former rival, whose place she had taken, ought,

it might have been thought, to have felt relieved. It was otherwise;

remorse for the benefits she had received from Madame de Montespan, and

for the manner in which those benefits had been repaid, overwhelmed her.

Tears stole down her cheeks, and she went into a strange privacy to hide

them. Madame de Bourgogne, who followed, was speechless with

astonishment.

The life and conduct of so famous a mistress, subsequent to her forced

retirement, have appeared to me sufficiently curious to describe at

length; and what happened at her death was equally characteristic of the

Court.

The death of the Duchesse de Nemours, which followed quickly upon that of

Madame de Montespart, made still more stir in the world, but of another

kind. Madame de Nemours was daughter, by a first marriage, of the last

Duc de Longueville. She was extremely rich, and lived in great

splendour. She had a strange look, and a droll way of dressing, big

eyes, with which she could scarcely see, a shoulder that constantly

twitched, grey hairs that she wore flowing, and a very imposing air.

She had a very bad temper, and could not forgive. When somebody asked

her if she said the Pater, she replied, yes, but that she passed by

without saying it the clause respecting pardon for our enemies. She did

not like her kinsfolk, the Matignons, and would never see nor speak to

any of them. One day talking to the King at a window of his cabinet,

she saw Matignon passing in the court below. Whereupon she set to

spitting five or six times running, and then turned to the King and

begged his pardon, saying, that she could never see a Matignon without

spitting in that manner. It may be imagined that devotion did not

incommode her. She herself used to tell a story, that having entered one

day a confessional, without being followed into the church, neither her

appearance nor her dress gave her confessor an idea of her rank. She

spoke of her great wealth, and said much about the Princes de Conde and

de Conti. The confessor told her to pass by all that. She, feeling that

the case was a serious one, insisted upon explaining and made allusion to

her large estates and her millions. The good priest believed her mad,

and told her to calm herself; to get rid of such ideas; to think no more

of them; and above all to eat good soups, if she had the means to procure

them. Seized with anger she rose and left the place. The confessor out

of curiosity followed her to the door. When he saw the good lady, whom

he thought mad, received by grooms, waiting women, and so on, he had like

to have fallen backwards; but he ran to the coach door and asked her

pardon. It was now her turn to laugh at him, and she got off scot-free

that day from the confessional.

Madame de Nemours had amongst other possessions the sovereignty of

Neufchatel. As soon as she was dead, various claimants arose to dispute

the succession. Madame de Mailly laid claim to it, as to the succession

to the principality of Orange, upon the strength of a very doubtful

alliance with the house of Chalons, and hoped to be supported by Madame

de Maintenon. But Madame de Maintenon laughed at her chimeras, as they

were laughed at in Switzerland.

M. le Prince de Conti was another claimant. He based his right upon the

will of the last Duc de Longueville, by which he had been called to all

the Duke’s wealth, after the Comte de Saint Paul, his brother, and his

posterity. In addition to these, there were Matignon and the dowager

Duchesse de Lesdiguieres, who claimed Neufchatel by right of their

relationship to Madame de Nemours.

Matignon was an intimate friend of Chamillart, who did not like the

Prince de Conti, and was the declared enemy of the Marechal de Villeroy,

the representative of Madame de Lesdiguieres, in this affair.

Chamillart, therefore, persuaded the King to remain neutral, and aided

Matignon by money and influence to get the start of the other claimants.

The haughty citizens of Neufchatel saw then all these suitors begging for

their suffrages, when a minister of the Elector of Brandenbourg appeared

amongst them, and disputed the pretensions of the Prince de Conti in

favour of his master, the Elector of Brandenbourg (King of Prussia), who

drew his claim from the family of Chalons. It was more distant; more

entangled if possible, than that of Madame de Mailly. He only made use

of it, therefore, as a pretext. His reasons were his religion, in

conformity with that of the country; the support of the neighbouring

Protestant cantons, allies, and protectors of Neufchatel; the pressing

reflection that the principality of Orange having fallen by the death of

William III. to M. le Prince de Conti, the King (Louis XIV.) had

appropriated it and recompensed him for it: and that he might act

similarly if Neufchatel fell to one of his subjects; lastly, a treaty

produced in good form, by which, in the event of the death of Madame de

Nemours, England and Holland agreed to declare for the Elector of

Brandenbourg, and to assist him by force in procuring this little state.

This minister of the Elector was in concert with the Protestant cantons,

who upon his declaration at once sided with him; and who, by the money

spent, the conformity of religion, the power of the Elector, the

reflection of what had happened at Orange, found nearly all the suffrages

favourable. So striking while the iron was hot, they obtained a

provisional judgment from Neufchatel, which adjudged their state to the

Elector until the peace; and in consequence of this, his minister was put

into actual possession, and M. le Prince de Conti saw himself constrained

to return more shamefully than he had returned once before, and was

followed by the other claimants.

Madame de Mailly made such an uproar at the news of this intrusion of the

Elector, that at last the attention of our ministers was awakened. They

found, with her, that it was the duty of the King not to allow this

morsel to be carried off from his subjects; and that there was danger in

leaving it in the hands of such a powerful Protestant prince, capable of

making a fortified place of it so close to the county of Burgundy, and on

a frontier so little protected. Thereupon, the King despatched a courier

to our minister in Switzerland, with orders to go to Neufchatel, and

employ every means, even menaces, to exclude the Elector, and to promise

that the neutrality of France should be maintained if one of her subjects

was selected, no matter which one. It was too late. The affair was

finished; the cantons were engaged, without means of withdrawing. They,

moreover, were piqued into resistance, by an appeal to their honour by

the electoral minister, who insisted on the menaces of Puysieux, our

representative, to whose memoir the ministers of England and Holland

printed a violent reply. The provisional judgment received no

alteration. Shame was felt; and resentment was testified during six

weeks; after which, for lack of being able to do better, this resentment

was appeased of itself. It may be imagined what hope remained to the

claimants of reversing at the peace this provisional judgment, and of

struggling against a prince so powerful and so solidly supported. No

mention of it was afterwards made, and Neufchatel has remained ever since

fully and peaceably to this prince, who was even expressly confirmed in

his possession at the peace by France.

The armies assembled this year towards the end of May, and the campaign

commenced. The Duc de Vendome was in command in Flanders, under the

Elector of Bavaria, and by his slothfulness and inattention, allowed

Marlborough to steal a march upon him, which, but for the failure of some

of the arrangements, might have caused serious loss to our troops. The

enemy was content to keep simply on the defensive after this, having

projects of attack in hand elsewhere to which I shall soon allude.

On the Rhine, the Marechal de Villars was in command, and was opposed by

the Marquis of Bayreuth, and afterwards by the Duke of Hanover, since

King of England. Villars was so far successful, that finding himself

feebly opposed by the Imperials, he penetrated into Germany, after having

made himself master of Heidelberg, Mannheim, and all the Palatinate, and

seized upon a number of cannons, provisions, and munitions of war. He

did not forget to tax the enemy wherever he went. He gathered immense

sums--treasures beyond all his hopes. Thus gorged, he could not hope

that his brigandage would remain unknown. He put on a bold face and

wrote to the King, that the army would cost him nothing this year.

Villars begged at the same time to be allowed to appropriate some of the

money he had acquired to the levelling of a hill on his estate which

displeased him. Another than he would have been dishonoured by such a

request. But it made no difference in his respect, except with the

public, with whom, however, he occupied himself but little. His booty

clutched, he thought of withdrawing from the enemy’s country, and passing

the Rhine.

He crossed it tranquilly, with his army and his immense booty, despite

the attempts of the Duke of Hanover to prevent him, and as soon as he was

on this side, had no care but how to terminate the campaign in repose.

Thus finished a campaign tolerably brilliant, if the sordid and

prodigious gain of the general had not soiled it. Yet that general, on

his return, was not less well received by the King.

At sea we had successes. Frobin, with vessels more feeble than the four

English ones of seventy guns, which convoyed a fleet of eighteen ships

loaded with provisions and articles of war, took two of those vessels of

war and the eighteen merchantmen, after four hours’ fighting, and set

fire to one of the two others. Three months after he took at the mouth

of the Dwiria seven richly-loaded Dutch merchant-ships, bound for

Muscovy. He took or sunk more than fifty during this campaign.

Afterwards he took three large English ships of war that he led to Brest,

and sank another of a hundred guns. The English of New England and of

New York were not more successful in Acadia; they attacked our colony

twelve days running, without success, and were obliged to retire with

much loss.

The maritime year finished by a terrible tempest upon the coast of

Holland, which caused many vessels to perish in the Texel, and submerged

a large number of districts and villages. France had also its share of

these catastrophes. The Loire overflowed in a manner hitherto unheard

of, broke down the embankments, inundated and covered with sand many

parts of the country, carried away villages, drowned numbers of people

and a quantity of cattle, and caused damage to the amount of above eight

millions. This was another of our obligations to M. de la Feuillade--an

obligation which we have not yet escaped from. Nature, wiser than man,

had placed rocks in the Loire above Roanne, which prevented navigation to

that place, the principal in the duchy of M. de la Feuillade. His

father, tempted by the profit of this navigation, wished to get rid of

the rocks. Orleans, Blois, Tours, in one word, all the places on the

Loire, opposed this. They represented the danger of inundations; they

were listened to, and although the M. de la Feuillade of that day was a

favourite, and on good terms with M. Colbert, he was not allowed to carry

out his wishes with respect to these rocks. His son, the M. de la

Feuillade whom we have seen figuring with so little distinction at the

siege of Turin, had more credit. Without listening to anybody, he blew

up the rocks, and the navigation was rendered free in his favour; the

inundations that they used to prevent have overflowed since at immense

loss to the King and private individuals. The cause was clearly seen

afterwards, but then it was too late.

The little effort made by the enemy in Flanders and Germany, had a cause,

which began to be perceived towards the middle of July. We had been

forced to abandon Italy. By a shameful treaty that was made, all our

troops had retired from that country into Savoy. We had given up

everything. Prince Eugene, who had had the glory of driving us out of

Italy, remained there some time, and then entered the county of Nice.

Forty of the enemy’s vessels arrived at Nice shortly afterwards, and

landed artillery. M. de Savoie arrived there also, with six or seven

thousand men. It was now no longer hidden that the siege of Toulon was

determined on. Every preparation was at once made to defend the place.

Tesse was in command. The delay of a day on the part of the enemy saved

Toulon, and it may be said, France. M. de Savoie had been promised money

by the English. They disputed a whole day about the payment, and so

retarded the departure of the fleet from Nice. In the end, seeing M. de

Savoie firm, they paid him a million, which he received himself. But in

the mean time twenty-one of our battalions had had time to arrive at

Toulon. They decided the fortune of the siege. After several

unsuccessful attempts to take the place, the enemy gave up the siege and

retired in the night, between the 22nd and 23rd of August, in good order,

and without being disturbed. Our troops could obtain no sort of

assistance from the people of Provence, so as to harass M. de Savoie in

his passage of the Var. They refused money, militia, and provisions

bluntly, saying that it was no matter to them who came, and that M. de

Savoie could not torment them more than they were tormented already.

The important news of a deliverance so desired arrived at Marly on

Friday, the 26th of August, and overwhelmed all the Court with joy. A

scandalous fuss arose, however, out of this event. The first courier who

brought the intelligence of it, had been despatched by the commander of

the fleet, and had been conducted to the King by Pontchartrain, who had

the affairs of the navy under his control. The courier sent by Tesse,

who commanded the land forces, did not arrive until some hours after the

other. Chamillart, who received this second courier, was piqued to

excess that Pontchartrain had outstripped him with the news. He declared

that the news did not belong to the navy, and consequently Pontchartrain

had no right to carry it to the King. The public, strangely enough,

sided with Chamillart, and on every side Pontchartrain was treated as a

greedy usurper. Nobody had sufficient sense to reflect upon the anger

which a master would feel against a servant who, having the information

by which that master could be relieved from extreme anxiety, should yet

withhold the information for six or eight hours, on the ground that to

tell it was the duty of another servant!

The strangest thing is, that the King, who was the most interested, had

not the force to declare himself on either side, but kept silent. The

torrent was so impetuous that Pontchartrain had only to lower his head,

keep silent, and let the waters pass. Such was the weakness of the King

for his ministers. I recollect that, in 1702, the Duc de Villeroy

brought to Marly the important news of the battle of Luzzara. But,

because Chamillart was not there, he hid himself, left the King and the

Court in the utmost anxiety, and did not announce his news until long

after, when Chamillart, hearing of his arrival, hastened to join him and

present him to the King. The King was so far from being displeased, that

he made the Duc de Villeroy Lieutenant-General before dismissing him.

There is another odd thing that I must relate before quitting this

affair. Tesse, as I have said, was charged with the defence of Toulon by

land. It was a charge of no slight importance. He was in a country

where nothing was prepared, and where everything was wanting; the fleet

of the enemy and their army were near at hand, commanded by two of the

most skilful captains of the day: if they succeeded, the kingdom itself

was in danger, and the road open to the enemy even to Paris. A general

thus situated would have been in no humour for jesting, it might have

been thought. But this was not the case with Tesse. He found time to

write to Pontchartrain all the details of the war and all that passed

amongst our troops in the style of Don Quixote, of whom he called himself

the wretched squire and the Sancho; and everything he wrote he adapted to

the adventures of that romance. Pontchartrain showed me these letters;

they made him die with laughing, he admired them so; and in truth they

were very comical, and he imitated that romance with more wit than I

believed him to possess. It appeared to me incredible, however, that a

man should write thus, at such a critical time, to curry, favour with a

secretary of state. I could not have believed it had I not seen it.

VOLUME 6.

CHAPTER XXXIX

I went this summer to Forges, to try, by means of the waters there, to

get rid of a tertian fever that quinquina only suspended. While there I

heard of a new enterprise on the part of the Princes of the blood, who,

in the discredit in which the King held them, profited without measure by

his desire for the grandeur of the illegitimate children, to acquire new

advantages which were suffered because the others shared them. This was

the case in question.

After the elevation of the mass--at the King’s communion--a folding-chair

was pushed to the foot of the altar, was covered with a piece of stuff,

and then with a large cloth, which hung down before and behind. At the

Pater the chaplain rose and whispered in the King’s ear the names of all

the Dukes who were in the chapel. The King named two, always the oldest,

to each of whom the chaplain advanced and made a reverence. During the

communion of the priest the King rose, and went and knelt down on the

bare floor behind this folding seat, and took hold of the cloth; at the

same time the two Dukes, the elder on the right, the other on the left,

each took hold of a corner of the cloth; the two chaplains took hold of

the other two corners of the same cloth, on the side of the altar, all

four kneeling, and the captain of the guards also kneeling and behind the

King. The communion received and the oblation taken some moments

afterwards, the King remained a little while in the same place, then

returned to his own, followed by the two Dukes and the captain of the

guards, who took theirs. If a son of France happened to be there alone,

he alone held the right corner of the cloth, and nobody the other; and

when M. le Duc d’Orleans was there, and no son of France was present, M.

le Duc d’Orleans held the cloth in like manner. If a Prince of the blood

were alone present, however, he held the cloth, but a Duke was called

forward to assist him. He was not privileged to act without the Duke.

The Princes of the blood wanted to change this; they were envious of the

distinction accorded to M. d’Orleans, and wished to put themselves on the

same footing. Accordingly, at the Assumption of this year, they managed

so well that M. le Duc served alone at the altar at the King’s communion,

no Duke being called upon to come and join him. The surprise at this was

very great. The Duc de la Force and the Marechal de Boufflers, who ought

to have served, were both present. I wrote to this last to say that such

a thing had never happened before, and that it was contrary to all

precedent. I wrote, too, to M. d’Orleans, who was then in Spain,

informing him of the circumstance. When he returned he complained to the

King. But the King merely said that the Dukes ought to have presented

themselves and taken hold of the cloth. But how could they have done so,

without being requested, as was customary, to come forward? What would

the king have thought of them if they had? To conclude, nothing could be

made of the matter, and it remained thus. Never then, since that time,

did I go to the communions of the King.

An incident occurred at Marly about the same time, which made much stir.

The ladies who were invited to Marly had the privilege of dining with the

King. Tables were placed for them, and they took up positions according

to their rank. The non-titled ladies had also their special place. It

so happened one day; that Madame de Torcy (an untitled lady) placed

herself above the Duchesse de Duras, who arrived at table a moment after

her. Madame de Torcy offered to give up her place, but it was a little

late, and the offer passed away in compliments. The King entered, and

put himself at table. As soon as he sat down, he saw the place Madame de

Torcy had taken, and fixed such a serious and surprised look upon her,

that she again offered to give up her place to the Duchesse de Duras; but

the offer was again declined. All through the dinner the King scarcely

ever took his eyes off Madame de Torcy, said hardly a word, and bore a

look of anger that rendered everybody very attentive, and even troubled

the Duchesse de Duras.

Upon rising from the table, the King passed, according to custom, into

the apartments of Madame de Maintenon, followed by the Princesses of the

blood, who grouped themselves around him upon stools; the others who

entered, kept at a distance. Almost before he had seated himself in his

chair, he said to Madame de Maintenon, that he had just been witness of

an act of “incredible insolence” (that was the term he used) which had

thrown him into such a rage that he had been unable to eat: that such an

enterprise would have been insupportable in a woman of the highest

quality; but coming, as it did, from a mere bourgeoise, it had so

affected him, that ten times he had been upon the point of making her

leave the table, and that he was only restrained by consideration for her

husband. After this outbreak he made a long discourse upon the genealogy

of Madame de Torcy’s family, and other matters; and then, to the

astonishment of all present, grew as angry as ever against Madame de

Torcy. He went off then into a discourse upon the dignity of the Dukes,

and in conclusion, he charged the Princesses to tell Madame de Torcy to

what extent he had found her conduct impertinent. The Princesses looked

at each other, and not one seemed to like this commission; whereupon the

King, growing more angry, said; that it must be undertaken however, and

left the robes; The news of what had taken place, and of the King’s

choler, soon spread all over the Court. It was believed, however, that

all was over, and that no more would be heard of the matter. Yet the

very same evening the King broke out again with even more bitterness than

before. On the morrow, too, surprise was great indeed, when it was found

that the King, immediately after dinner, could talk of nothing but this

subject, and that, too, without any softening of tone. At last he was

assured that Madame de Torcy had been spoken to, and this appeased him a

little. Torcy was obliged to write him a letter, apologising for the

fault of Madame de Torcy; and the King at this grew content. It may be

imagined what a sensation this adventure produced all through the Court.

While upon the subject of the King, let me relate an anecdote of him,

which should have found a place ere this. When M. d’Orleans was about to

start for Spain, he named the officers who were to be of his suite.

Amongst others was Fontpertius. At that name the King put on a serious

look.

“What! my nephew,” he said. “Fontpertius! the son of a Jansenist--of

that silly woman who ran everywhere after M. Arnould! I do not wish that

man to go with you.”

“By my faith, Sire,” replied the Duc d’Orleans, “I know not what the

mother has done; but as for the son, he is far enough from being a

Jansenist, I’ll answer for it; for he does not believe in God.”

“Is it possible, my nephew?” said the King, softening.

“Nothing more certain, Sire, I assure you.”

“Well, since it is so,” said the King, “there is no harm: you can take

him with you.”

This scene--for it can be called by no other name--took place in the

morning. After dinner M. d’Orleans repeated it to me, bursting with

laughter, word for word, just as I have written it. When we had both

well laughed at this, we admired the profound instruction of a discreet

and religious King, who considered it better not to believe in God than

to be a Jansenist, and who thought there was less danger to his nephew

from the impiety of an unbeliever than from the doctrines of a sectarian.

M. d’Orleans could not contain himself while he told the story, and never

spoke of it without laughing until the tears came into his eyes. It ran

all through the Court and all over the town, and the marvellous thing

was, that the King was not angry at this. It was a testimony of his

attachment to the good doctrine which withdrew him further and further

from Jansenism. The majority of people laughed with all their heart.

Others, more wise, felt rather disposed to weep than to laugh, in

considering to what excess of blindness the King had reached.

For a long time a most important project had knocked at every door,

without being able to obtain a hearing anywhere. The project was this:--

Hough, an English gentleman full of talent and knowledge, and who, above

all, knew profoundly the laws of his country, had filled various posts in

England. As first a minister by profession, and furious against King

James; afterwards a Catholic and King James’s spy, he had been delivered

up to King William, who pardoned him. He profited by this only to

continue his services to James. He was taken several times, and always

escaped from the Tower of London and other prisons. Being no longer able

to dwell in England he came to France, where he occupied himself always

with the same line of business, and was paid for that by the King (Louis

XIV.) and by King James, the latter of whom he unceasingly sought to re-

establish. The union of Scotland with England appeared to him a

favourable conjuncture, by the despair of that ancient kingdom at seeing

itself reduced into a province under the yoke of the English. The

Jacobite party remained there; the vexation caused by this forced union

had increased it, by the desire felt to break that union with the aid of

a King that they would have reestablished. Hough, who was aware of the

fermentation going on, made several secret journeys to Scotland, and

planned an invasion of that country; but, as I have said, for a long time

could get no one to listen to him.

The King, indeed, was so tired of such enterprises, that nobody dared to

speak to him upon this. All drew back. No one liked to bell the cat.

At last, however, Madame de Maintenon being gained over, the King was

induced to listen to the project. As soon as his consent was gained to

it, another scheme was added to the first. This was to profit by the

disorder in which the Spanish Low Countries were thrown, and to make them

revolt against the Imperialists at the very moment when the affair of

Scotland would bewilder the allies, and deprive them of all support from

England. Bergheyck, a man well acquainted with the state of those

countries, was consulted, and thought the scheme good. He and the Duc de

Vendome conferred upon it in presence of the King.

After talking over various matters, the discussion fell, upon the Meuse,

and its position with reference to Maastricht. Vendome held that the

Meuse flowed in a certain direction. Bergheyck opposed him. Vendome,

indignant that a civilian should dare to dispute military movements with

him, grew warm. The other remained respectful and cool, but firm.

Vendome laughed at Bergheyck, as at an ignorant fellow who did not know

the position of places. Bergheyck maintained his point. Vendome grew

more and more hot. If he was right, what he proposed was easy enough; if

wrong, it was impossible. It was in vain that Vendome pretended to treat

with disdain his opponent; Bergheyck was not to be put down, and the

King, tired out at last with a discussion upon a simple question of fact,

examined the maps. He found at once that Bergheyck was right. Any other

than the King would have felt by this what manner of man was this general

of his taste, of his heart, and of his confidence; any other than Vendome

would have been confounded; but it was Bergheyck in reality who was so,

to see the army in such hands and the blindness of the King for him! He

was immediately sent into Flanders to work up a revolt, and he did it so

well, that success seemed certain, dependent, of course, upon success in

Scotland.

The preparations for the invasion of that country were at once commenced.

Thirty vessels were armed at Dunkerque and in the neighbouring ports.

The Chevalier de Forbin was chosen to command the squadron. Four

thousand men were brought from Flanders to Dunkerque; and it was given

out that this movement was a mere change of garrison. The secret of the

expedition was well kept; but the misfortune was that things were done

too slowly. The fleet, which depended upon Pontchartrain, was not ready

in time, and that which depended upon Chamillart, was still more

behindhand. The two ministers threw the fault upon each other; but the

truth is, both were to blame. Pontchartrain was more than accused of

delaying matters from unwillingness; the other from powerlessness.

Great care was taken that no movement should be seen at Saint Germain.

The affair, however, began in time to get noised abroad. A prodigious

quantity of arms and clothing for the Scotch had been embarked; the

movements by sea and land became only too visible upon the coast. At

last, on Wednesday, the 6th of March, the King of England set out from

Saint Germain. He was attended by the Duke of Perth, who had been his

sub-preceptor; by the two Hamiltons, by Middleton, and a very few others.

But his departure had been postponed too long. At the moment when all

were ready to start, people learned with surprise that the English fleet

had appeared in sight, and was blockading Dunkerque. Our troops, who

were already on board ship, were at once landed. The King of England

cried out so loudly against this, and proposed so eagerly that an attempt

should be made to pass the enemy at all risks, that a fleet was sent out

to reconnoitre the enemy, and the troops were re-embarked. But then a

fresh mischance happened. The Princess of England had had the measles,

and was barely growing convalescent at the time of the departure of the

King, her brother. She had been prevented from seeing him, lest he

should be attacked by the same complaint. In spite of this precaution,

however, it declared itself upon him at Dunkerque, just as the troops

were re-embarked. He was in despair, and wished to be wrapped up in

blankets and carried on board. The doctors said that it would kill him;

and he was obliged to remain. The worst of it was, that two of five

Scotch deputies who had been hidden at Montrouge near Paris, had been

sent into Scotland a fortnight before, to announce the immediate arrival

of the King with arms and troops. The movement which it was felt this

announcement would create, increased the impatience for departure. At

last, on Saturday, the 19th of March, the King of England, half cured and

very weak, determined to embark in spite of his physicians, and did so.

The enemy’s vessels hats retired; so, at six o’clock in the morning, our

ships set sail with a good breeze, and in the midst of a mist, which hid

them from view in about an hour.

Forty-eight hours after the departure of our squadron, twenty-seven

English ships of war appeared before Dunkerque. But our fleet was away.

The very first night it experienced a furious tempest. The ship in which

was the King of England took shelter afterwards behind the works of

Ostend. During the storm, another ship was separated from the squadron,

and was obliged to take refuge on the coast of Picardy. This vessel, a

frigate, was commanded by Rambure, a lieutenant. As, soon as he was able

he sailed after the squadron that he believed already in Scotland. He

directed his course towards Edinburgh, and found no vessel during all the

voyage. As he approached the mouth of the river, he saw around him a

number of barques and small vessels that he could not avoid, and that he

determined in consequence to approach with as good a grace as possible.

The masters of these ships’ told him that the King was expected with

impatience, but that they had no news of him, that they had come out to

meet him, and that they would send pilots to Rambure, to conduct him up

the river to Edinburgh, where all was hope and joy. Rambure, equally

surprised that the squadron which bore the King of England had not

appeared, and by the publicity of his forthcoming arrival, went up

towards Edinburgh more and more surrounded by barques, which addressed to

him the same language. A gentleman of the country passed from one of

these barques upon the frigate. He told Rambure that the principal

noblemen of Scotland had resolved to act together, that these noblemen

could count upon more than twenty thousand men ready to take up arms, and

that all the towns awaited only the arrival of the King to proclaim him.

More and more troubled that the squadron did not appear, Rambure, after a

time, turned back and went in search of it. As he approached the mouth

of the river, which he had so lately entered, he heard a great noise of

cannon out at sea, and a short time afterwards he saw many vessels of war

there. Approaching more and more, and quitting the river, he

distinguished our squadron, chased by twenty-six large ships of war and a

number of other vessels, all of which he soon lost sight of, so much was

our squadron in advance. He continued on his course in order to join

them; but he could not do so until all had passed by the mouth of the

river. Then steering clear of the rear-guard of the English ships, he

remarked that the English fleet was hotly chasing the ship of the King of

England, which ran along the coast, however, amid the fire of cannon and

oftentimes of musketry. Rambure tried, for a long time, to profit by the

lightness of his frigate to get ahead; but, always cut off by the enemy’s

vessels, and continually in danger of being taken, he returned to

Dunkerque, where he immediately despatched to the Court this sad and

disturbing news. He was followed, five or six days after, by the King of

England, who returned to Dunkerque on the 7th of April, with his vessels

badly knocked about.

It seems that the ship in which was the Prince, after experiencing the

storm I have already alluded to, set sail again with its squadron, but

twice got out of its reckoning within forty-eight hours; a fact not easy

to understand in a voyage from Ostend to Edinburgh. This circumstance

gave time to the English to join them; thereupon the King held a council,

and much time was lost in deliberations. When the squadron drew near the

river, the enemy was so close upon us, that to enter, without fighting

either inside or out, seemed impossible. In this emergency it was

suggested that our ships should go on to Inverness, about eighteen or

twenty leagues further off. But this was objected to by Middleton and

the Chevalier Forbin, who declared that the King of England was expected

only at Edinburgh, and that it was useless to go elsewhere; and

accordingly the project was given up, and the ships returned to France.

This return, however, was not accomplished without some difficulty. The

enemy’s fleet attacked the rear guard of ours, and after an obstinate

combat, took two vessels of war and some other vessels. Among the

prisoners made by the English were the Marquis de Levi, Lord Griffin, and

the two sons of Middleton; who all, after suffering some little bad

treatment, were conducted to London.

Lord Griffin was an old Englishman, who deserves a word of special

mention. A firm Protestant, but much attached to the King of England, he

knew nothing of this expedition until after the King’s departure. He

went immediately in quest of the Queen. With English freedom he

reproached her for the little confidence she had had in him, in spite of

his services and his constant fidelity, and finished by assuring her that

neither his age nor his religion would hinder him from serving the King

to the last drop of his blood. He spoke so feelingly that the Queen was

ashamed. After this he went to Versailles, asked M. de Toulouse for a

hundred Louis and a horse, and without delay rode off to Dunkerque, where

he embarked with the others. In London he was condemned to death; but

he showed so much firmness and such disdain of death, that his judges

were too much ashamed to avow the execution to be carried out. The Queen

sent him one respite, then another, although he had never asked for

either, and finally he was allowed to remain at liberty in London on

parole. He always received fresh respites, and lived in London as if it

his own country, well received everywhere. Being informed that these

respites would never cease, he lived thus several years, and died very

old, a natural death. The other prisoners were equally well treated. It

was in this expedition that the King of England first assumed the title

of the Chevalier de Saint George, and that his enemies gave him that of

the Pretender; both of which have remained to him. He showed much will

and firmness, which he spoiled by a docility, the result of a bad

education, austere and confined, that devotion, ill understood, together

with the desire of maintaining him in fear and dependence, caused the

Queen (who, with all her sanctity, always wished to dominate) to give

him. He asked to serve in the next campaign in Flanders, and wished to

go there at once, or remain near Dunkerque. Service was promised him,

but he was made to return to Saint Germain. Hough, who had been made a

peer of Ireland before starting, preceded him with the journals of the

voyage, and that of Forbin, to whom the King gave a thousand crowns

pension and ten thousand as a recompense.

The King of England arrived at Saint Germain on Friday, the 20th of

April, and came with the Queen, the following Sunday, to Marly, where our

King was. The two Kings embraced each other several times, in the

presence of the two Courts. But the visit altogether was a sad one. The

Courts, which met in the garden, returned towards the Chateau, exchanging

indifferent words in an indifferent way.

Middleton was strongly suspected of having acquainted the English with

our project. They acted, at all events, as if they had been informed of

everything, and wished to appear to know nothing. They made a semblance

of sending their fleet to escort a convoy to Portugal; they got in

readiness the few troops they had in England and sent them towards

Scotland; and the Queen, under various pretexts, detained in London,

until the affair had failed, the Duke of Hamilton, the most powerful

Scotch lord; and the life and soul of the expedition. When all was over,

she made no arrests, and wisely avoided throwing Scotland into despair.

This conduct much augmented her authority in England, attached all hearts

to her, and took away all desire of stirring again by taking away all

hope of success. Thus failed a project so well and so secretly conducted

until the end, which was pitiable; and with this project failed that of

the Low Countries, which was no longer thought of.

The allies uttered loud cries against this attempt on the part of a power

they believed at its last gasp, and which, while pretending to seek

peace, thought of nothing less than the invasion of Great Britain. The

effect of our failure was to bind closer, and to irritate more and more

this formidable alliance.

CHAPTER XL

Brissac, Major of the Body-guards, died of age and ennui about this time,

more than eighty years old, at his country-house, to which he had not

long retired. The King had made use of him to put the Guards upon that

grand military footing they have reached. He had acquired the confidence

of the King by his inexorable exactitude, his honesty, and his aptitude.

He was a sort of wild boar, who had all the appearance of a bad man,

without being so in reality; but his manners were, it must be admitted,

harsh and disagreeable. The King, speaking one day of the majors of the

troops, said that if they were good, they were sure to be hated.

“If it is necessary to be perfectly hated in order to be a good major,”

replied M. de Duras, who was behind the King with the baton, “behold,

Sire, the best major in France!” and he took Brissac, all confusion, by

the arm. The King laughed, though he would have thought such a sally

very bad in any other; but M. de Duras had put himself on such a free

footing, that he stopped at nothing before the King, and often said the

sharpest things. This major had very robust health, and laughed at the

doctors--very often, even before the King, at Fagon, whom nobody else

would have dared to attack. Fagon replied by disdain, often by anger,

and with all his wit was embarrassed. These short scenes were sometimes

very amusing.

Brissac, a few years before his retirement, served the Court ladies a

nice turn. All through the winter they attended evening prayers on

Thursdays and Sundays, because the King went there; and, under the

pretence of reading their prayer-books, had little tapers before them,

which cast a light on their faces, and enabled the King to recognise them

as he passed. On the evenings when they knew he would not go, scarcely

one of them went. One evening, when the King was expected, all the

ladies had arrived, and were in their places, and the guards were at

their doors. Suddenly, Brissac appeared in the King’s place, lifted his

baton, and cried aloud, “Guards of the King, withdraw, return to your

quarters; the King is not coming this evening.” The guards withdrew; but

after they had proceeded a short distance, were stopped by brigadiers

posted for the purpose, and told to return in a few minutes. What

Brissac had said was a joke. The ladies at once began to murmur one to

another. In a moment or two all the candles were put out, and the

ladies, with but few exceptions, left the chapel. Soon after the King

arrived, and, much astonished to see so few ladies present, asked how it

was that nobody was there. At the conclusion of the prayers Brissac

related what he had done, not without dwelling on the piety of the Court

ladies. The King and all who accompanied him laughed heartily. The

story soon spread, and these ladies would have strangled Brissac if they

had been able.

The Duchesse de Bourgogne being in the family way this spring, was much

inconvenienced. The King wished to go to Fontainebleau at the

commencement of the fine season, contrary to his usual custom; and had

declared this wish. In the mean time he desired to pay visits to Marly.

Madame de Bourgogne much amused him; he could not do without her, yet so

much movement was not suitable to her state. Madame de Maintenon was

uneasy, and Fagon gently intimated his opinion. This annoyed the King,

accustomed to restrain himself for nothing, and spoiled by having seen

his mistresses travel when big with child, or when just recovering from

their confinement, and always in full dress. The hints against going to

Marly bothered him, but did not make him give them up. All he would

consent to was, that the journey should put off from the day after

Quasimodo to the Wednesday of the following week; but nothing could make

him delay his amusement, beyond that time, or induce him to allow the

Princess to remain at Versailles.

[Illustration: The King’s Walk At Versailles--Painted by J. L. Jerome--484]

On the following Saturday, as the King was taking a walk after mass, and

amusing himself at the carp basin between the Chateau and the

Perspective, we saw the Duchesse de Lude coming towards him on foot and

all alone, which, as no lady was with the King, was a rarity in the

morning. We understood that she had something important to say to him,

and when he was a short distance from her, we stopped so as to allow him

to join her alone. The interview was not long. She went away again, and

the King came back towards us and near the carps without saying a word.

Each saw clearly what was in the wind, and nobody was eager to speak. At

last the King, when quite close to the basin, looked at the principal

people around, and without addressing anybody, said, with an air of

vexation, these few words:

“The Duchesse de Bourgogne is hurt.”

M. de la Rochefoucauld at once uttered an exclamation. M. de Bouillon,

the Duc de Tresmes, and Marechal de Boufflers repeated in a low tone the

words I have named; and M. de la Rochefoucauld returning to the charge,

declared emphatically that it was the greatest misfortune in the world,

and that as she had already wounded herself on other occasions, she might

never, perhaps, have any more children.

“And if so,” interrupted the King all on a sudden, with anger, “what is

that to me? Has she not already a son; and if he should die, is not the

Duc de Berry old enough to marry and have one? What matters it to the

who succeeds me,--the one or the other? Are the not all equally my

grandchildren?” And immediately, with impetuosity he added, “Thank God,

she is wounded, since she was to be so; and I shall no longer be annoyed

in my journeys and in everything I wish to do, by the representations of

doctors, and the reasonings of matrons. I shall go and come at my

pleasure, and shall be left in peace.”

A silence so deep that an ant might be heard to walk, succeeded this

strange outburst. All eyes were lowered; no one hardly dared to breathe.

All remained stupefied. Even the domestics and the gardeners stood

motionless.

This silence lasted more than a quarter of an hour. The King broke it as

he leaned upon a balustrade to speak of a carp. Nobody replied. He

addressed himself afterwards on the subject of these carps to domestics,

who did not ordinarily join in the conversation. Nothing but carps was

spoken of with them. All was languishing, and the King went away some

time after. As soon as we dared look at each other--out of his sight,

our eyes met and told all. Everybody there was for the moment the

confidant of his neighbour. We admired--we marvelled--we grieved, we

shrugged our shoulders. However distant may be that scene, it is always

equally present to me. M. de la Rochefoucauld was in a fury, and this

time without being wrong. The chief ecuyer was ready to faint with

affright; I myself examined everybody with my eyes and ears, and was

satisfied with myself for having long since thought that the King loved

and cared for himself alone, and was himself his only object in life.

This strange discourse sounded far and wide-much beyond Marly.

Let me here relate another anecdote of the King--a trifle I was witness

of. It was on the 7th of May, of this year, and at Marly. The King

walking round the gardens, showing them to Bergheyck, and talking with

him upon the approaching campaign in Flanders, stopped before one of the

pavilions. It was that occupied by Desmarets, who had recently succeeded

Chamillart in the direction of the finances, and who was at work within

with Samuel Bernard, the famous banker, the richest man in Europe, and

whose money dealings were the largest. The King observed to Desmarets

that he was very glad to see him with M. Bernard; then immediately said

to this latter:

“You are just the man never to have seen Marly--come and see it now; I

will give you up afterwards to Desmarets.”

Bernard followed, and while the walk lasted the King spoke only to

Bergheyck and to Bernard, leading them everywhere, and showing them

everything with the grace he so well knew how to employ when he desired

to overwhelm. I admired, and I was not the only one, this species of

prostitution of the King, so niggard of his words, to a man of Bernard’s

degree. I was not long in learning the cause of it, and I admired to see

how low the greatest kings sometimes find themselves reduced.

Our finances just then were exhausted. Desmarets no longer knew of what

wood to make a crutch. He had been to Paris knocking at every door. But

the most exact engagements had been so often broken that he found nothing

but excuses and closed doors. Bernard, like the rest, would advance

nothing. Much was due to him. In vain Desmarets represented to him the

pressing necessity for money, and the enormous gains he had made out of

the King. Bernard remained unshakeable. The King and the minister were

cruelly embarrassed. Desmarets said to the King that, after all was said

and done, only Samuel Bernard could draw them out of the mess, because it

was not doubtful that he had plenty of money everywhere; that the only

thing needed was to vanquish his determination and the obstinacy--even

insolence--he had shown; that he was a man crazy with vanity, and capable

of opening his purse if the King deigned to flatter him.

It was agreed, therefore, that Desmarets should invite Bernard to dinner

--should walk with him--and that the King should come and disturb them as

I have related. Bernard was the dupe of this scheme; he returned from

his walk with the King enchanted to such an extent that he said he would

prefer ruining himself rather than leave in embarrassment a Prince who

had just treated him so graciously, and whose eulogiums he uttered with

enthusiasm! Desmarets profited by this trick immediately, and drew much

more from it than he had proposed to himself..

The Prince de Leon had an adventure just about this time, which made much

noise. He was a great, ugly, idle, mischievous fellow, son of the Duc de

Rohan, who had given him the title I have just named. He had served in

one campaign very indolently, and then quitted the army, under pretence

of ill-health, to serve no more. Glib in speech, and with the manners of

the great world, he was full of caprices and fancies; although a great

gambler and spendthrift, he was miserly, and cared only for himself. He

had been enamoured of Florence, an actress, whom M. d’Orleans had for a

long time kept, and by whom he had children, one of whom is now

Archbishop of Cambrai. M. de Leon also had several children by this

creature, and spent large sums upon her. When he went in place of his

father to open the States of Brittany, she accompanied him in a coach and

six horses, with a ridiculous scandal. His father was in agony lest he

should marry her. He offered to insure her five thousand francs a-year

pension, and to take care of their children, if M. de Leon would quit

her. But M. de Leon would not hear of this, and his father accordingly

complained to the King. The King summoned M. de Leon into his cabinet;

but the young man pleaded his cause so well there, that he gained pity

rather than condemnation. Nevertheless, La Florence was carried away

from a pretty little house at the Ternes, near Paris, where M. de Leon

kept her, and was put in a convent. M. de Leon became furious; for some

time he would neither see nor speak of his father or mother, and repulsed

all idea of marriage.

At last, however, no longer hoping to see his actress, he not only

consented, but wished to marry. His parents were delighted at this, and

at once looked about for a wife for him. Their choice, fell upon the

eldest daughter of the Duc de Roquelaure, who, although humpbacked and

extremely ugly, she was to be very rich some day, and was, in fact, a

very good match. The affair had been arranged and concluded up to a

certain point, when all was broken off, in consequence of the haughty

obstinacy with which the Duchesse de Roquelaure demanded a larger sum

with M. de Leon than M. de Rohan chose to give.

The young couple were in despair: M. de Leon, lest his father should

always act in this way, as an excuse for giving him nothing; the young

lady, because she, feared she should rot in a convent, through the

avarice of her mother, and never marry. She was more than twenty-four

years, of age; he was more than eight-and-twenty. She was in the convent

of the Daughters of the Cross in the Faubourg Saint Antoine.

As soon as M. de Leon learnt that the marriage was broken off, he

hastened to the convent; and told all to Mademoiselle de Roquelaure;

played the passionate, the despairing; said that if they waited for their

parents’ consent they would never marry; and that she would rot in her

convent. He proposed, therefore, that, in spite of their parents, they

should marry and be their own guardians. She agreed to this project; and

he went away in order to execute it.

One of the most intimate friends of Madame de Roquelaure was Madame de la

Vieuville, and she was the only person (excepting Madame de Roquelaure

herself) to whom the Superior of the convent had permission to confide

Mademoiselle de Roquelaure. Madame de la Vieuville often came to see

Mademoiselle de Roquelaure to take her out, and sometimes sent for her.

M. de Leon was made acquainted with this, and took his measures

accordingly. He procured a coach of the same size, shape, and fittings

as that of Madame de la Vieuville, with her arms upon it, and with three

servants in her livery; he counterfeited a letter in her handwriting and

with her seal, and sent this coach with a lackey well instructed to carry

the letter to the convent, on Tuesday morning, the 29th of May, at the

hour Madame de la Vieuville was accustomed to send for her.

Mademoiselle de Roquelaure, who had been let into the scheme, carried the

letter to the Superior of the convent, and said Madame de la Vieuville

had sent for her. Had the Superior any message to send?

The Superior, accustomed to these invitations; did not even look at the

letter, but gave her consent at once. Mademoiselle de Roquelaure,

accompanied solely by her governess, left the convent immediately, and

entered the coach, which drove off directly. At the first turning it

stopped, and the Prince de Leon, who had been in waiting, jumped-in. The

governess at this began to cry out with all her might; but at the very

first sound M. de Leon thrust a handkerchief into her mouth and stifled

the noise. The coachman meanwhile lashed his horses, and the vehicle

went off at full speed to Bruyeres near Menilmontant, the country-house

of the Duc de Lorges, my brother-in-law, and friend of the Prince de

Leon, and who, with the Comte de Rieux, awaited the runaway pair.

An interdicted and wandering priest was in waiting, and as soon as they

arrived married them. My brother-in-law then led these nice young people

into a fine chamber, where they were undressed, put to bed, and left

alone for two or three hours. A good meal was then given to them, after

which the bride was put into the coach, with her attendant, who was in

despair, and driven back to the convent.

Mademoiselle de Roquelaure at once went deliberately to the Superior,

told her all that happened, and then calmly went into her chamber, and

wrote a fine letter to her mother, giving her an account of her marriage,

and asking for pardon; the Superior of the convent, the attendants, and

all the household being, meanwhile, in the utmost emotion at what had

occurred.

The rage of the Duchesse de Roquelaure at this incident may be imagined.

In her first unreasoning fury, she went to Madame de la Vieuville, who,

all in ignorance of what had happened, was utterly at a loss to

understand her stormy and insulting reproaches. At last Madame de

Roquelaure saw that her friend was innocent of all connection with the

matter; and turned the current of her wrath upon M. de Leon, against whom

she felt the more indignant, inasmuch as he had treated her with much

respect and attention since the rupture, and had thus, to some extent,

gained her heart. Against her daughter she was also indignant, not only

for what she had done, but because she had exhibited much gaiety and

freedom of spirit at the marriage repast, and had diverted the company by

some songs.

The Duc and Duchesse de Rohan were on their side equally furious,

although less to be pitied, and made a strange uproar. Their son,

troubled to know how to extricate himself from this affair, had recourse

to his aunt, Soubise, so as to assure himself of the King. She sent him

to Pontchartrain to see the chancellor. M. de Leon saw him the day after

this fine marriage, at five o’clock in the morning, as he was dressing.

The chancellor advised him to do all he could to gain the pardon of his

father and of Madame de Roquelaure. But he had scarcely begun to speak,

when Madame de Roquelaure sent word to say, that she was close at hand,

and wished the chancellor to come and see her. He did so, and she

immediately poured out all her griefs to him, saying that she came not to

ask, his advice, but to state her complaint as to a friend (they were

very intimate), and as to the chief officer of justice to demand justice

of him. When he attempted to put in a word on behalf of M. de Leon, her

fury burst out anew; she would not listen to his words, but drove off to

Marly, where she had an interview with Madame de Maintenon, and by her

was presented to the King.

As soon as she was in his presence, she fell down on her knees before

him, and demanded justice in its fullest extent against M. de Leon. The

King raised her with the gallantry of a prince to whom she had not been

indifferent, and sought to console her; but as she still insisted upon

justice, he asked her if she knew fully what she asked for, which was

nothing less than the head of M. de Leon. She redoubled her entreaties

notwithstanding this information, so that the King at last promised her

that she should have complete justice. With that, and many compliments,

he quitted her, and passed into his own rooms with a very serious air,

and without stopping for anybody.

The news of this interview, and of what had taken place, soon spread

through the chamber. Scarcely had people begun to pity Madame de

Roquelaure, than some, by aversion for the grand imperial airs of this

poor mother,--the majority, seized by mirth at the idea of a creature,

well known to be very ugly and humpbacked, being carried off by such an

ugly gallant,--burst out laughing, even to tears, and with an uproar

completely scandalous. Madame de Maintenon abandoned herself to mirth,

like the rest, and corrected the others at last, by saying it was not

very charitable, in a tone that could impose upon no one.

Madame de Saint-Simon and I were at Paris. We knew with all Paris of

this affair, but were ignorant of the place of the marriage and the part

M. de Lorges had had in it, when the third day after the adventure I was

startled out of my sleep at five o’clock in the morning, and saw my

curtains and my windows open at the same time, and Madame de Saint-Simon

and her brother (M. de Lorges) before me. They related to me all that

had occurred, and then went away to consult with a skilful person what

course to adopt, leaving me to dress. I never saw a man so crestfallen

as M. de Lorges. He had confessed what he had done to a clever lawyer,

who had much frightened him. After quitting him, he had hastened to us

to make us go and see Pontchartrain. The most serious things are

sometimes accompanied with the most ridiculous. M. de Lorges upon

arriving knocked at the door of a little room which preceded the chamber

of Madame de Saint-Simon. My daughter was rather unwell. Madame de

Saint-Simon thought she was worse, and supposing it was I who had

knocked, ran and opened the door. At the sight of her brother she ran

back to her bed, to which he followed her, in order to relate his

disaster. She rang for the windows to be opened, in order that she might

see better. It so happened that she had taken the evening before a new

servant, a country girl of sixteen, who slept in the little room. M. de

Lorges, in a hurry to be off, told this girl to make haste in opening the

windows, and then to go away and close the door. At this, the simple

girl, all amazed, took her robe and her cotillon, and went upstairs to an

old chambermaid, awoke her, and with much hesitation told her what had

just happened, and that she had left by the bedside of Madame de Saint

Simon a fine gentleman, very young, all powdered, curled, and decorated,

who had driven her very quickly out of the chamber. She was all of a

tremble, and much astonished. She soon learnt who he was. The story was

told to us, and in spite of our disquietude, much diverted us.

We hurried away to the chancellor, and he advised the priest, the

witnesses to the signatures of the marriage, and, in fact, all concerned,

to keep out of the way, except M. de Lorges, who he assured us had

nothing to fear. We went afterwards to Chamillart, whom we found much

displeased, but in little alarm. The King had ordered an account to be

drawn up of the whole affair. Nevertheless, in spite of the uproar made

on all sides, people began to see that the King would not abandon to

public dishonour the daughter of Madame de Roquelaure, nor doom to the

scaffold or to civil death in foreign countries the nephew of Madame de

Soubise.

Friends of M. and Madame de Roquelaure tried to arrange matters. They

represented that it would be better to accept the marriage as it was than

to expose a daughter to cruel dishonour. Strange enough, the Duc and

Duchesse de Rohan were the most stormy. They wished to drive a very hard

bargain in the matter, and made proposals so out of the way, that nothing

could have been arranged but for the King. He did what he had never done

before in all his life; he entered into all the details; he begged, then

commanded as master; he had separate interviews with the parties

concerned; and finally appointed the Duc d’Aumont and the chancellor to

draw up the conditions of the marriage.

As Madame de Rohan, even after this, still refused to give her consent,

the King sent for her, and said that if she and her husband did not at

once give in, he would make the marriage valid by his own sovereign

authority. Finally, after so much noise, anguish, and trouble, the

contract was signed by the two families, assembled at the house of the

Duchesse de Roquelaure. The banns were published, and the marriage took

place at the church of the Convent of the Cross, where Mademoiselle de

Roquelaure had been confined since her beautiful marriage, guarded night

and day by five or six nuns. She entered the church by one door, Prince

de Leon by another; not a compliment or a word passed between them; the

curate said mass; married them; they mounted a coach, and drove off to

the house of a friend some leagues from Paris. They paid for their folly

by a cruel indigence which lasted all their lives, neither of them having

survived the Duc de Rohan, Monsieur de Roquelaure, or Madame de

Roquelaure. They left several children.

CHAPTER XLI

The war this year proceeded much as before. M. d’Orleans went to Spain

again. Before taking the field he stopped at Madrid to arrange matters.

There he found nothing prepared, and every thing in disorder. He was

compelled to work day after day, for many hours, in order to obtain the

most necessary supplies. This is what accounted for a delay which was

maliciously interpreted at Paris into love for the Queen. M. le Duc was

angry at the idleness in which he was kept; even Madame la Duchesse, who

hated him, because she had formerly loved him too well, industriously

circulated this report, which was believed at Court, in the city, even in

foreign countries, everywhere, save in Spain, where the truth was too

well known. It was while he was thus engaged that he gave utterance to a

pleasantry that made Madame de Maintenon and Madame des Ursins his two

most bitter enemies for ever afterwards.

One evening he was at table with several French and Spanish gentlemen,

all occupied with his vexation against Madame des Ursins, who governed

everything, and who had not thought of even the smallest thing for the

campaign. The supper and the wine somewhat affected M. d’Orleans. Still

full of his vexation, he took a glass, and, looking at the company, made

an allusion in a toast to the two women, one the captain, the other the

lieutenant, who governed France and Spain, and that in so coarse and yet

humorous a manner, that it struck at once the imagination of the guests.

No comment was made, but everybody burst out laughing, sense of drollery

overcoming prudence, for it was well known that the she-captain was

Madame de Maintenon, and the she-lieutenant Madame des Ursins. The

health was drunk, although the words were not repeated, and the scandal

was strange.

Half an hour at most after this, Madame des Ursins was informed of what

had taken place. She knew well who were meant by the toast, and was

transported with rage. She at once wrote an account of the circumstance

to Madame de Maintenon, who, for her part, was quite as furious. ‘Inde

ira’. They never pardoned M. d’Orleans, and we shall see how very nearly

they succeeded in compassing his death. Until then, Madame de Maintenon

had neither liked nor disliked M. d’Orleans. Madame des Ursins had

omitted nothing in order to please him. From that moment they swore the

ruin of this prince. All the rest of the King’s life M. d’Orleans did

not fail to find that Madame de Maintenon was an implacable and cruel

enemy. The sad state to which she succeeded in reducing him influenced

him during all the rest of his life. As for Madame des Ursins, he soon

found a change in her manner. She endeavoured that everything should

fail that passed through his hands. There are some wounds that can never

be healed; and it must be admitted that the Duke’s toast inflicted one

especially of that sort. He felt this; did not attempt any

reconciliation; and followed his usual course. I know not if he ever,

repented of what he had said, whatever cause he may have had, so droll

did it seem to him, but he has many times spoken of it since to me,

laughing with all his might. I saw all the sad results which might arise

from his speech, and nevertheless, while reproaching M. d’Orleans, I

could not help laughing myself, so well, so simply; and so wittily

expressed was his ridicule of the government on this and the other side

of the Pyrenees.

At last, M. le Duc d’Orleans found means to enter upon his campaign, but

was so ill-provided, that he never was supplied with more than a

fortnight’s subsistence in advance. He obtained several small successes;

but these were more than swallowed up by a fatal loss in another

direction. The island of Sardinia, which was then under the Spanish

Crown, was lost through the misconduct of the viceroy, the Duke of

Veragua, and taken possession of by the troops of the Archduke. In the

month of October, the island of Minorca also fell into the hands of the

Archduke. Port Mahon made but little resistance; so that with this

conquest and Gibraltar, the English found themselves able to rule in the

Mediterranean, to winter entire fleets there, and to blockade all the

ports of Spain upon that sea. Leaving Spain in this situation, let us

turn to Flanders.

Early in July, we took Ghent and Bruges by surprise, and the news of

these successes was received with the most unbridled joy at

Fontainebleau. It appeared easy to profit by these two conquests,

obtained without difficulty, by passing the Escaut, burning Oudenarde,

closing the country to the enemies, and cutting them off from all

supplies. Ours were very abundant, and came by water, with a camp that

could not be attacked. M. de Vendome agreed to all this; and alleged

nothing against it. There was only one difficulty in the way; his

idleness and unwillingness to move from quarters where he was

comfortable. He wished to enjoy those quarters as long as possible, and

maintained, therefore, that these movements would be just as good if

delayed. Monseigneur le Duc de Bourgogne maintained on the contrary,

with all the army--even the favourites of M. de Vendome--that it would be

better to execute the operation at once, that there was no reason for

delay, and that delay might prove disastrous. He argued in vain.

Vendome disliked fatigue and change of quarters. They interfered with

the daily life he was accustomed to lead, and which I have elsewhere

described. He would not move.

Marlborough clearly seeing that M. de Vendome did not at once take

advantage of his position, determined to put it out of his power to do

so. To reach Oudenarde, Marlborough had a journey to make of twenty-five

leagues. Vendome was so placed that he could have gained it in six

leagues at the most. Marlborough put himself in motion with so much

diligence that he stole three forced marches before Vendome had the

slightest suspicion or information of them. The news reached him in

time, but he treated it with contempt according to his custom, assuring

himself that he should outstrip the enemy by setting out the next

morning. Monseigneur le Duc de Bourgogne pressed him to start that

evening; such as dared represented to him the necessity and the

importance of doing so. All was vain--in spite of repeated information

of the enemy’s march. The neglect was such that bridges had not been

thought of for a little brook at the head of the camp, which it was

necessary to cross.