"How! has your your majesty already chosen them?" asked Marie
Antoinette, anxiously.
The king nodded. "It was my first sacred duty to seek guides for my inexperience, and I have chosen ministers who are able statesmen, and have already served before."
The queen's eyes brightened, and even Count von Mercy seemed surprised and pleased.
"Do, your majesty, let us have their names," said Marie Antoinette.
"First, Monsieur de Maurepas."
The queen uttered an exclamation. "The minister of the regency, who has been banished for forty years!"
"The same. He was a friend of my father. He will be prime minister; and as I am so unfortunate as to have to bear the weight of royalty at twenty years, I have taken care to select old and experienced men as my counsellors."
"And who is to succeed the Duke d'Aiguillon?" cried Marie Antoinette, "for I presume that your majesty intends to give him his dismissal."
"I would be glad to retain him as my minister," said the king, pointedly, "for his policy is identical with mine. He has the interests of France at heart, and has never suffered himself to be led away by foreign influence. But unluckily, he was too intimate with Du Barry, and on this ground I shall dismiss him."
"And his successor?" asked the queen, scarcely able to restrain her bitter disappointment.