“But, monsieur,” I answered M. Colbert, “you are not, then, aware that every time I am a third person at one of these interminable conversations, I always meet with some mark of disapproval, and sometimes with painful mortifications?”

“I have been told so,” the sick man replied; “but I have also been told that you imprudently call down on yourself these outbursts of the King.  What need have you to quarrel with Madame de Maintenon over a look, a word, a movement or a gesture?  You seem to me persuaded that love enters into the King’s friendship for the Marquise.  Well, suppose you have guessed aright his Majesty’s sentiments; will your dissatisfaction and your sarcasms prevent those sentiments from existing, and the prince from indulging them?

“You know, madame, that he generally gets everything he wants, and M. de Montespan experienced that when he wished to set himself against your joint wills.

“I am nearer my end and my release than my doctors think.  In leaving this whirlpool of disappointments, ambitions, errors, and mutual injustice, I should like to see you free, at peace, reconciled to your real interests, and out of reach, forever, of the vicissitudes of fortune.  In my eyes, your position is that of a ship-owner whom the ocean has constantly favoured, and who has reaped great riches.  With moderation and prudence, it depended on himself to profit by his astonishing success, and at last to enjoy his life; but ambition and vain desire drive him afresh upon this sea, so fruitful in shipwrecks, and his last venture destroys all his prosperity and all his many labours.

“Our excellent Queen has gone to rest from her troubles and her journeys; and I, madame, am going to rest not long after her, having worn out my strength on great things that are as nothing.”

The Marquis de Seignelay, eldest son of this minister, counted on succeeding to the principal offices of his father.  He made a mistake.  The place of secretary of state and controller-general passed to the President Pelletier, who had been chosen by M. Colbert himself; and the superintendence of buildings, gardens, and works went to swell the numerous functions of the Marquis de Louvois, who wished for and counted on it.

Mm. de Blainville and Seignelay had good posts, proportioned to their capacity; the King never ceased to look upon them as the children of his dear M. Colbert.

[It mast be remembered that the young Marquis de Seignelay was already Minister of Marine, an office which remained with him.—­Ed.]

Before his death, this minister saw his three daughters become duchesses.  The King, who had been pleased to make these marriages, had given each of them a dowry of a million in cash.

As for the Abbe Colbert, already promoted to the Bishopric of Montpellier (to which three important abbeys were joined), he had the Archbishopric of Toulouse, with an immense revenue.  It is true that he took a pleasure in rebuilding his archiepiscopal palace and cathedral out of a huge and ancient treasure, which he discovered whilst pulling down some old ruin to make a salon.