Saint-Simon accuses him of a love of brutal practical jokes, and asserts that the death of the Latin poet Santeuil, at Dijon, in 1694, was due to his having given him a glass of champagne into which he had emptied the contents of his snuff-box. But we can find no confirmation of this story, and probably there is no more truth in it than in a good many other of Saint-Simon’s anecdotes.
Notwithstanding the indolence which in his youth had been the despair of his tutors, the pains bestowed upon his education had been by no means wasted, and even his enemy Saint-Simon is fain to admit that he was a well-read and intelligent man. In war his abilities were infinitely superior to those of his father, and had he enjoyed, like him, the advantage of the Great Condé’s training, it is quite probable that he would have made a name for himself, that is to say, if Louis XIV., who had little liking for his son-in-law, could ever have been persuaded to entrust him with an independent command. Between 1688 and the Peace of Ryswick he served in several campaigns, and proved himself a very capable officer, as well as displaying brilliant courage, notably at the siege of Namur and in the battles of Steenkirke and Neerwinden. In the campaigns of the War of the Spanish Succession he took no part, and it would seem that, in spite of his military talents, or perhaps because of them, Louis XIV. did not desire to employ him.
With his wife Monsieur le Duc lived on good terms, though, in common with most aristocratic husbands of the time, he unfortunately found it impossible to concentrate his affections upon their lawful object. Of his mistresses the most noted was the beautiful Madame de Mussy. She was a little woman, but exquisitely shaped, “with a dazzling complexion and ravishing arms and bosom.” The wife of a counsellor to the Parlement of Dijon, “who was too much in love with the wine of Beaune to guard a treasure so difficult to defend,” Monsieur le Duc had met her when he was presiding over the Estates of Burgundy in place of his father, and, profiting by her husband’s addiction to the bottle, had paid her a court which was soon crowned with success. When, at length, the bibulous counsellor learned what had been going on under his very nose, he was furious, and “carried his resentment even so far as to give his wife several blows.” His violence furnished the lady with a pretext for leaving him which she was not slow to seize, and, while M. de Mussy was petitioning the Parlement of Dijon for a decree empowering him to have her shut up in a convent, she effected her escape, followed her lover to Paris, and threw herself upon his protection. This the prince readily promised, and, shortly afterwards, Madame de Mussy found herself the occupant of a luxuriously-furnished house in the precincts of the Temple, where she was soon surrounded by a little Court, which was composed not only of the Marquis de la Fare, the Abbé Chaulieu, the Comte de Fiesque and other friends of Monsieur le Duc, but also of several ladies of the Court, such as the Duchesse de Bouillon and the Marquise de Bellefonds, who were not too particular what company they kept, so long as it was sufficiently amusing.
La petite Mussy, if she had been prudent, might have continued to live a life of luxury and pleasure for many years, for the passion which she had inspired in the heart of Monsieur le Duc was no ephemeral one. But, unfortunately for her, she happened to meet, one night at the Opera, that notorious lady-killer, the Comte d’Albert, who, after being banished from France, on account of his intrigue with Madame de Luxembourg, had recently been expelled from Brussels, for making himself too agreeable to the Mlle. Maupin—the heroine of Théophile Gauthier’s romance—then mistress of the Elector of Bavaria.
The count, having no other amorous engagement on hand just then, decided to make a conquest of Madame de Mussy. The task was, of course, easy enough for a gentleman who, we are assured, had only to show himself to ensure an immediate capitulation, and soon Madame de Mussy had become as indifferent to her titular lover as she had formerly been to her husband. Monsieur le Duc, “finding that she no longer responded to his caresses with her accustomed ardour,” had her watched, and ere long discovered the truth. His wrath was terrible, though, happily, he contented himself by venting it upon the furniture, mirrors, and porcelain of his perfidious mistress, among which he raged with such fury that in a few moments the apartment was strewn with the wreckage of what had represented a comfortable little fortune.
Madame de Mussy, whom love for her fascinating count had inspired with a courage of which she might not have otherwise been capable, boldly faced the storm, and informed the infuriated prince that “she was not his wife, that he had nothing wherewith to reproach her, and that she was in love with the Comte d’Albert, who was far more amiable than his Highness, as he might judge for himself by taking the trouble to look in a mirror.”
Monsieur le Duc, beside himself with passion, swore that he would hand her over to her husband, who would take good care to have her shut up in a convent for the rest of her days, and took his departure, vowing vengeance.
Knowing enough of the vindictive character of the prince to be aware that this threat was no idle one, Madame de Mussy recognized that she ought not to lose a moment in placing herself beyond his reach. The Comte d’Albert, now reinstated in the good graces of the Elector of Bavaria, had recently set out for Madrid, where he had been appointed that prince’s envoy, and she at once resolved to follow him thither. That same night, accompanied by her confidential femme de chambre and subsequent historian, Mlle. Valdory, she left Paris, disguised in masculine attire, and, after many adventures, for the War of the Succession was then raging in Spain, reached Madrid in safety. She had expected to find there the Comte d’Albert and consolation for her hardships and misfortunes in his arms; but not only was she deceived in this hope, but she learned that her lover was false to her, and that he had recently consented, doubtless for a substantial consideration, to make an honest woman of Mlle. de Montigny, a cast-off mistress of the Elector of Bavaria. Worn out by the fatigues and privations she had suffered during her journey from Paris, devoured by jealousy, and tortured by remorse, the unhappy Madame de Mussy fell into a decline and died six months later.[244]
As for Monsieur le Duc, he consoled himself for his mistress’s perfidy by a liaison with Madame de Rupelmonde—the wife of a Flemish gentleman in the Spanish service—whom Saint-Simon describes as “brown as a cow and possessed of unparalleled impudence.” To this lady succeeded a certain Madame Locmaria, who was soon replaced, in her turn, by the pretty daughter of an upholsterer in the Rue des Fossés-Monsieur-le-Prince.[245]
Madame la Duchesse, however, had certainly no right to take exception to her husband’s little affairs, for, though Madame de Caylus assures us that she “lived with him like an angel,” it would seem that her marriage vows sat very lightly upon her. This daughter of Madame de Montespan was an exceedingly pretty, accomplished, and charming young woman; but, if she had inherited her mother’s beauty, intelligence, and fascination, she had also her full share of that too celebrated lady’s less agreeable qualities, being selfish, extravagant, and deceitful, while her mordant wit made her universally dreaded. “Her wit shines in her eyes,” writes Madame; “but there is some malignity in them also. I always say that she reminds me of a pretty cat which, while you play with it, lets you feel its claws.” “Although she was slightly deformed,” says Saint-Simon, “her face was formed by the most tender loves and her nature made to dally with them.... She possessed the art of placing every one at their ease; there was nothing about her which did not tend naturally to please, with a grace unparalleled, even in her slightest actions. She made captive even those who had the most cause to fear her, and those who had the best of reasons to hate her required often to recall the fact to resist her charms.... Sportive, gay, and merry, she passed her youth in frivolity and in pleasures of all kinds,[246] and, whenever the opportunity presented itself, they extended even to debauchery. With these qualities, she possessed much intelligence and much capacity for intrigue and affairs, with a suppleness which cost her nothing. She was scornful, mocking, bitterly sarcastic, incapable of friendship and very capable of hatred; mischievous, haughty, implacable, prolific in base artifices and in the most cruel chansons, with which she gaily assailed persons whom she pretended to love and who passed their lives with her.[247] She was the siren of the poets; she had all their charms and all their perils.”