Two Germans were implicated in the conspiracy; but I am only surprised at one of them, the Brigadier Sandrazky, who was with me daily, and in whose behalf I have often spoken, because his father served my brother as commandant at Frankendahl; he died in the present year. The other is the Count Schlieben, who has only one arm. I am not astonished at him; for, in the first place, I know how he lost his arm; and, in the second, he is a friend and servant of the Princesse des Ursins: they expect to take him at Lyons. Sandrazky was at my toilette the day before yesterday; as he looked melancholy, I asked him what was the matter? He replied, "I am ill with vexation: I love my wife, who is an Englishwoman, very tenderly, and she is no less fond of me; but, as we have not the means of keeping up an establishment, she must go into a convent. This distresses me so much that I am really very unwell."

I was grieved to hear this, and resolved to solicit my son for him.

My son sometimes does as is said in Atys,—[The opera of Atys, act ii., scene 3.]—"Vous pourriez aimer et descendre moins bas;" for when Jolis was his rival, he became attached to one of his daughter's 'filles de chambre', who hoped to marry Jolis because he was rich; for this reason she received him better than my son, who, however, at last gained her favour. He afterwards took her away from his daughter, and had her taught to sing, for she had a fine voice.

The printed letters of Cellamara disclose the whole of the conspiracy. The Abbe Brigaut, too, it is said, begins to chatter about it. This affair has given me so much anxiety that I only sleep through mere exhaustion. My heart beats incessantly; but my son has not the least care about it. I beseech him, for God's sake, not to go about in coaches at night, and he promises me he will not; but he will no more keep that promise than he did when he made it to me before.

It is now eight days since the Duc du Maine and his wife were arrested (29th December). She was at Paris, and her husband at Sceaux in his chateau. One of the four captains of the King's Guard arrested the Duchess, the Duke was arrested only by a lieutenant of the Body Guard. The Duchess was immediately taken to Dijon and her husband to the fortress of Doullens. I found Madame d'Orleans much more calm than I had expected. She was much grieved, and wept bitterly; but she said that, since her brother was convicted, she must confess he had done wrong; that he was, with his wife, the cause of his own misfortune, but that it was no less painful to her to know that her own brother had thus been plotting against her husband. His guilt was proved upon three points: first, in a paper under the hand of the Spanish Ambassador, the Prince of Cellamara, in which he imparted to Alberoni that the Duchesse and the Duc du Maine were at the head of the conspiracy; he tells him how many times he has seen them, by whose means, and in what place; then he says that he has given money to the Duc du Maine to bribe certain persons, and he mentions the sum. There are already two men in the Bastille who confess to have received money, and others who have voluntarily stated that they conducted the Ambassador to the Duke and Duchess, and negotiated everything between the parties. The greater part of their servants have been sent to the Bastille. The Princess is deeply afflicted; and, although the clearest proofs are given of her children's crime, she throws all the blame upon the Duke, her grandson, who, she says, has accused them falsely, because he hates them, and she has refused to see him. The Duchess is more moderate in her grief. The little Princesse de Conti heartily pities her sister and weeps copiously, but the elder Princess does not trouble herself about her uncle and aunt.

The Cardinals cannot be arrested, but they may be exiled; therefore the Cardinal de Polignac has been ordered to retire to one of his abbeys and to remain there. It was love that turned his head. He was formerly a great friend of my son's, and he did not change until he became attached to that little hussy.

Magni

[Foucault de Magni, introducteur des ambassadeurs, and son of a Counsellor of State. Duclos says he was a silly fellow, who never did but, one wise thing, which was to run away.]

has not yet been taken; he flies from one convent to another. He stayed with the Jesuits a long time.

1719