I shall add, as notes to the foregoing account of the Court of France, some remarkable passages that will throw more light on it. I have mentioned the friendship of the Duchesse de Choiseul for Madame du Deffand. The Prince de Beauvau was so attached to the latter that he scarce ever missed seeing her one day when he was in Paris: and as I had known him above thirty years, and came so often to Paris and lived so much with them, he and the Princess talked their politics before me without reserve. One day in particular, after the Duc de Choiseul’s fall, and the removal of the Prince from his government of Languedoc in consequence, Madame du Deffand was expressing her fears to the Prince and Princess, that he would be removed also from his post of Captain of the King’s Guard. “Oh!” said the Prince, “the King will not take that from me for his own sake.” Madame du Deffand asked what he meant? “Why,” replied the Prince, “he would not think his person safe if I was not the Captain of his Guard. When Prince Charles passed the Rhine, I asked leave to go thither as a volunteer. The King would give me no answer for three days, and then refused me leave: he was afraid to be without me.” In short, they said such strong things, that I feared they would, on reflection, be sorry they had gone so far before a foreigner, and therefore, and that they might not think me curious, I rose and went into the next room. When I returned, the Princess, who was exceedingly quick-sighted, suspected my motive, and questioned me whether she had not penetrated me. When I owned she was in the right, “Now,” said she, “you think you have done a very civil thing, but you have done a very rude one; for if you thought these things that we have said too strong for you to hear, it is telling us that they were too strong for us to utter.”
With all this good sense, her haughtiness and violence were extreme. In 1775, on the Princesse de Lamballe being placed above the Princesse de Chimay in the Queen’s family, the Prince and Princesse de Beauvau would have had their niece, Madame de Chimay, quit her place rather than submit. Madame du Deffand disputed the point with them. I said nothing. When they were gone, Madame du Deffand asked me on which side I was. I said on her’s. “Then,” said she, “how could you be such a flatterer to them as not to take my part?” “Because,” said I, “you argued only on their duty to the King and Queen; but my reasons were too strong to be given. Monsieur de Beauvau, whose mother was mistress, and he himself a natural son of only a Duke of Lorraine, thinks it below his niece to give place to the Princesse de Lamballe, whose husband’s grandfather was a natural son of Louis Quatorze!”[21]
But the most extraordinary anecdote was the following letter, which Louis the Fifteenth, when he was endeavouring to pacify the civil war in his Court between Madame du Barry and the Duc de Choiseul, wrote to the latter. It is so extraordinary, his Majesty even hinting a possibility of his marrying his mistress, that I must give an account how it came into my hands. It was read to Madame du Deffand by the Duc or Duchesse de Choiseul, but they would not give her a copy. However, as she heard it more than once, she dictated to her secretary as many of the passages as she could remember, but disguised the names under Persian names for fear of losing the paper or having it found in her possession. That copy she gave me, which I here set down, I solemnly protest, word for word as I received it. It is a striking picture of that Monarch’s character, full of weakness, good-humour, frankness;—and still more of his love of quiet and disinclination to change a Minister he was used to.
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“Anecdotes Persannes.
“Sapor, Sultan de Perse, écrivit une lettre fort singulière à son Atemadoulet, dont voici quelques fragmens:
“‘Vous connoissez mal la personne que j’aime; vous êtes environné de gens qui vous préviennent contre elle: ne les ecoutez point, il y a long tems qu’ils me déplaisent. Je vous promets de vous mettre bien avec celle que j’aime, et de détruire toutes les préventions qu’on veut lui donner contre vous. Je vous dirai confidemment que je ne puis me passer de femmes. Celle ci me plait, et si je l’épousois, tout le monde tomberoit à ses genoux. Le Mogol,[22] voulant se marier, et voulant épouser une belle femme, fit plusieurs voyages sans rencontrer ce qu’il cherchoit. Je vous le répète, je ne puis me passer de femmes; mais il m’en faut une belle. La sœur du Mogol,[23] que je pourrois épouser, ne l’est pas. La personne, avec qui je vis, me plait; consentez à bien vivre avec elle; rien n’est plus aisé, et vous m’obligerez infiniment.’
“L’Atemadoulet resista; et quelques mois après il fut disgracié.” Madame du Deffand adds, “J’oubliois un trait de cette lettre; ‘je ne veux point une femme de qualité: je ne veux point non plus à l’exemple de Thamas,[24] mon ayeul, une matrone.’”
Perhaps it will not be thought very wise in the Duc de Choiseul to have resisted such a letter. Should the original ever appear, as is not impossible, it will corroborate the truth of the rest that I have related. I trust much to collateral evidence for confirming the veracity of these Memoirs.