BOOK 2.

Madame sent for me yesterday evening, at seven o’clock, to read something to her; the ladies who were intimate with her were at Paris, and M. de Gontaut ill.  “The King,” said she, “will stay late at the Council this evening; they are occupied with the affairs of the Parliament again.”  She bade me leave off reading, and I was going to quit the room, but she called out, “Stop.”  She rose; a letter was brought in for her, and she took it with an air of impatience and ill-humour.  After a considerable time she began to talk openly, which only happened when she was extremely vexed; and, as none of her confidential friends were at hand, she said to me, “This is from my brother.  It is what he would not have dared to say to me, so he writes.  I had arranged a marriage for him with the daughter of a man of title; he appeared to be well inclined to it, and I, therefore, pledged my word.  He now tells me that he has made inquiries; that the parents are people of insupportable hauteur; that the daughter is very badly educated; and that he knows, from authority not to be doubted, that when she heard this marriage discussed, she spoke of the connection with the most supreme contempt; that he is certain of this fact; and that I was still more contemptuously spoken of than himself.  In a word, he begs me to break off the treaty.  But he has let me go too far; and now he will make these people my irreconcilable enemies.  This has been put in his head by some of his flatterers; they do not wish him to change his way of living; and very few of them would be received by his wife.”  I tried to soften Madame, and, though I did not venture to tell her so, I thought her brother right.  She persisted in saying these were lies, and, on the following Sunday, treated her brother very coldly.  He said nothing to me at that time; if he had, he would have embarrassed me greatly.  Madame atoned for everything by procuring favours, which were the means of facilitating the young lady’s marriage with a gentleman of the Court.  Her conduct, two months after marriage, compelled Madame to confess that her brother had been perfectly right.

I saw my friend, Madame du Chiron.  “Why,” said she, “is the Marquise so violent an enemy to the Jesuits?  I assure you she is wrong.  All powerful as she is, she may find herself the worse for their enmity.”  I replied that I knew nothing about the matter.  “It is, however, unquestionably a fact; and she does not feel that a word more or less might decide her fate.”—­“How do you mean?” said I.  “Well, I will explain myself fully,” said she.  “You know what took place at the time the King was stabbed:  an attempt was made to get her out of the Castle instantly.  The Jesuits have no other object than the salvation of their penitents; but they are men, and hatred may, without their being aware of it, influence their minds, and inspire them with a greater degree of severity