The Equipage at Full Speed.--The Poor Vine-grower.--Sensibility of Madame
de Maintenon.--Her Popularity.--One Has the Right to Crush a Man Who Will
Not Get Out of the Way.--What One Sees.--What They Tell You.--All Ends at
the Opera.--One Can Be Moved to Tears and Yet Like Chocolate.
Another event with a tragical issue, and one to which I contributed even
less, served to feed and foster that hatred, mixed with envy, which the
rabble populace guards always so persistently towards the favourites of
kings or fortune.
Naturally quick and impatient, I cannot endure to move with calm and
state along the roads. My postilions, my coachmen know it, driving in
such fashion that no equipage is ever met which cleaves the air like
mine.
I was descending one day the declivity of the Coeur-Volant, between Saint
Germain and Marly. The Marquises de Maintenon and d'Hudicourt were in my
carriage with M. le Duc du Maine, so far as I can remember. We were
going at the pace which I have just told, and my outriders, who rode in
advance, were clearing the way, as is customary. A vine-grower, laden
with sticks, chose this moment to cross the road, thinking himself, no
doubt, agile enough to escape my six horses. The cries of my people were
useless. The imprudent fellow took his own course, and my postilions, in
spite of their efforts with the reins, could not prevent themselves from
passing over his body; the wheels followed the horses; the poor man was
cut in pieces.
At the lamentations of the country folk and the horrified passers-by, we
stopped. Madame de Maintenon wished to alight, and when she perceived
the unfortunate vine-grower disfigured with his wounds, she clasped her
hands and fell to weeping. The Marquise d'Hudicourt, who was always
simplicity itself, followed her friend's example; there was nothing but
groans and sorrowful exclamations. My coachman blamed the postilions,
the postilions the man's obstinacy.
Madame de Maintenon, speaking as though she were the mistress, bade them
be silent, and dared to say to them before all the crowd: "If you
belonged to me, I would soon settle you." At these words all the
spectators applauded, and cried: "Vive Madame de Maintenon!"
Irritated at what I had just heard, I put my head out of the door, and,
turning to these sentimental women, I said to them: "Be good enough to
get in, mesdames; are you determined to have me stoned?"
They mounted again, after having left my purse with the poor relations of
the dead man; and as far as Ruel, which was our destination, I was
compelled to listen to their complaints and litanies.
"Admit, madame," I declared to Madame de Maintenon, "that any person
except myself could and would detest you for the harm you have done me.
Your part was to blame the postilions lightly and the rustic very
positively. My equipage did not come unexpectedly, and my two outriders
had signalled from their horses."
"Madame," she replied, "you have not seen, as I did, those eyes of the
unhappy man forced violently from their sockets, his poor crushed head,
his palpitating heart, from which the blood soaked the pavement; such a
sight has moved and broken my own heart. I was, as I am still, quite
beside myself, and, in such a situation, it is permissible to forget
discretion in one's speech and the proprieties. I had no intention of
giving you pain; I am distressed at having done so. But as for your
coachmen I loathe them, and, since you undertake their defence, I shall
not for the future show myself in your equipage."
[In one of her letters, Madame de Maintenon speaks of this accident, but
she does not give quite the same account of it. It is natural that
Madame de Montespan seeks to excuse her people and herself if she
can.--EDITOR'S NOTE.]
At Ruel, she dared take the same tone before the Duchesse de Richelieu,
who rebuked her for officiousness, and out of spite, or some other
reason, Madame de Maintenon refused to dine. She had two or three
swooning fits; her tears started afresh four or five times, and the
Marquise d'Hudicourt, who dined only by snatches, went into a corner to
sob and weep along with her.
"Admit, madame," I said then to Madame de Maintenon, "your excessive
grief for an unknown man is singular. He was, perhaps, actually a
dishonest fellow. The accident which you come back to incessantly, and
which distresses me also, is doubtless deplorable; but, after all, it is
not a murder, an ambush, a premeditated assassination. I imagine that if
such a catastrophe had happened elsewhere, and been reported to us in a
gazette or a book, you would have read of it with interest and
commiseration; but we should not have seen you clasp your hands over your
head, turn red and pale, utter loud cries, shed tears, sob, and scold a
coachman, postilions, perhaps even me. The event, would, nevertheless,
be actually the same. Admit, then, madame, and you, too, Madame
d'Hudicourt, that there is an exaggeration in your sorrow, and that you
would have made, both of you, two excellent comedians."
Madame de Maintenon, piqued at these last words, sought to make us
understand, and even make us admit, that there is a great difference
between an event narrated to you by a third party, and an event which one
has seen. Madame de Richelieu shut her mouth pleasantly with these
words: "We know, Madame la Marquise, how much eloquence and wit is yours.
We approve all your arguments, past and to be. Let us speak no further
of an accident which distresses you; and since you require to be
diverted, let us go to the Opera, which is only two leagues off."
She consented to accompany us, for fear of proving herself entirely
ridiculous; but to delay us as much as possible, she required a cup of
chocolate, her favourite dish, her appetite having returned as soon as
she had exhausted the possibilities of her grief.