It is true that everybody thought the king dead when Mme. de Maintenon left him; but he had only lost consciousness for a time, and afterwards recovered it. I do not want to say anything more about these sad matters, which affect me cruelly. The king showed the greatest firmness up to his last moment. He said to Mme. de Maintenon, smiling: “I have always heard it said that it was difficult to die; I assure you that I find it very easy.” He remained twenty-four hours without speaking to any one; but during that time he prayed and repeated constantly: “My God, have pity upon me; Lord, I am waiting to appear before you; why do you not take me, my God?” He then repeated with much fervour the Lord’s prayer and the Creed, and he died recommending his soul to God.
September 17th, 1715.
Parliament has recognized my son’s rights to the regency, rights which his birth bestowed upon him indisputably. The king had told him he had made a will in which he would find nothing to complain of; and yet that will is found to be wholly in favour of the Duc du Maine; it is not therefore difficult to divine who dictated it—but do not let us talk of it.
My son has too often heard me speak of you not to know you and appreciate you, and he bids me offer you his affectionate compliments. The duties with which he is charged are far from easy; he finds everything left in a very miserable state; time is necessary to repair the situation; nothing presents itself that is not care and trouble, and for my son, as for me, the future does not appear under flattering colours. More than forty placards attacking him have been posted in Paris, and the dukes and peers are caballing against him in Parliament; but my son is so beloved by the people and the troops that his enemies are having their trouble for their pains, and all they get is the shame of it. I admit, however, that I am very uneasy in seeing him the target of so much animosity.
Ah! my dear Louise, you do not know this country. They laud my son to the skies, but only for the purpose, each man for himself, of getting some profit from it; fifty persons want the same office, and as it can only be given to one, forty-nine malcontents are made, who become rabid enemies. My son works so hard from six in the morning till midnight that I fear his health will suffer.
October, 1715.
I have been to Saint-Cloud while the Duchesse de Berry came here. Between ourselves, I wish to have nothing to do with her; we do not sympathize. I live politely with her, as I would with a stranger, but I do not see her often, and I will not concern myself with anything that she does, or that her mother and her sisters do; I busy myself about my own affairs. The Court is not what it is in Germany, and no longer what it was in the days of Monsieur, when we dined together, and all of us met every evening in the state salons. In these days we live apart; my son takes his meals alone; I the same; his wife the same; she is so lazy she is never able to resolve at a given moment to do the slightest thing; she lies on a sofa all day, and Mme. de Berry follows that example at the Luxembourg; so you see, my dear Louise, that there cannot be any Court. Ah! you do not know the French; as long as they hope to obtain what they want they are charming; but out of fifty aspirants, forty-nine enemies are made, who cabal and play the devil. I know the Court and State too well to rejoice for a moment that my son is regent.
I have kept the word I gave you, and have earnestly entreated for the poor Reformers who are at the galleys; I have obtained a promise—but just now No is said to none. I do not know what my son may have said to Lord Stair about the Reformers, but I can assure you that when I spoke to him he gave me good hope, saying at the same time that there were very strong reasons which prevented him from doing the thing promptly.
In the days of Cardinal Mazarin they wrote horrible books against him. He appeared much irritated, and sent for all the copies as if he intended to burn them up. When he had got them all he sold them secretly and made ten thousand crowns out of them. Then he laughed and said: “The French are pretty fellows; as long as I let them sing and write, they will let me do just as I choose.”
Mme. de Maintenon is at Saint-Cyr, in the institution which she founded herself. She was never the king’s mistress, but something much higher. She was governess to Mme. de Montespan’s children, and from that she got a footing in salons, but she went much farther. The devil in hell cannot be worse than she has been; her ambition has flung all France into wretchedness. La Fontanges was a good girl; I knew her well; she was one of my maids-of-honour, handsome from head to foot, but she had no judgment.