When, at that lottery of the Cardinal’s, I won the King’s portrait, the Queen-mother called me into her closet and desired to know how such a thing could possibly have happened.  I replied that, during the garter-incident, the two tickets had got mixed.  “Ah, in that case,” said the princess, “the occurrence was quite a natural one.  So keep this portrait, since it has fallen into your hands; but, for God’s sake, don’t try and make yourself pleasant to my son; for you’re only too fascinating as it is.  Look at that little La Valliere, what a mess she has got into, and what chagrin she has caused my poor Maria Theresa!”

I replied to her Majesty that I would rather let myself be buried alive than ever imitate La Valliere, and I said so then because that was really what I thought.

The Queen-mother softened, and gave me her hand to kiss, now addressing me as “madame,” and anon as “my daughter.”  A few days afterwards she wished to walk in the gallery with me, and said to me, “If God suffers me to live, I will make you lady-in-waiting; be sure of that.”

Anne of Austria was a tall, fine, dark woman, with brown eyes, like those of the King.  The Infanta, her niece, is a very pretty blonde, blue-eyed, but short in stature.

To her slightest words the Queen-mother gives sense and wit; her daughter-in-law’s speeches and actions are of the simplest, most commonplace kind.  Were it not for the King, she would pass her life in a dressing-gown, night-cap, and slippers.  At Court ceremonies and on gala-days, she never appears to be in a good humour; everything seems to weigh her down, notably her diamonds.

However, she has no remarkable defect, and one may say that she is devoid of goodness, just as she is devoid of badness.  When coming among us, she contrived to bring with her Molina, the daughter of her nurse, a sort of comedy confidante, who soon gave herself Court airs, and who managed to form a regular little Court of her own.  Without her sanction nothing can be obtained of the Queen.  My lady Molina is the great, the small, and the unique counsellor of the princess, and the King, like the others, remains submissive to her decisions and her inspection.

French cookery, by common consent, is held to be well-nigh perfect in its excellence; yet the Infanta could never get used to our dishes.  The Senora Molina, well furnished with silver kitchen utensils, has a sort of private kitchen or scullery reserved for her own use, and there it is that the manufacture takes place of clove-scented chocolate, brown soups and gravies, stews redolent with garlic, capsicums, and nutmeg, and all that nauseous pastry in which the young Infanta revels.

Ever since La Valliere’s lasting triumph, the Queen seems to have got it into her head that she is despised; and at table I have often heard her say, “They will help themselves to everything, and won’t leave me anything.”