April 2, 1703.
I am delighted, my dear grandmother, that you have given me a commission. I send you a sample of tea, which they assure me is excellent. If you find it so I will send you more. The king does not take it; M. Fagon orders him sage tea, which agrees with him. I hope the use of this tea will do the same with you; no one in the world feels more interest in you than I, my dear grandmother.
[Only two letters of the year 1704 have been preserved. The health of the princess caused such anxiety that she was made (according to Dangeau’s Journal) to keep her bed from February 8th until after the birth of her first child, the Duc de Bretagne, born June 25, 1704. She was then eighteen years old.]
September 1, 1704.
I am ashamed, my dear grandmother, to have been so long without writing to you; but I have had many ailments that prevented it. You will surely believe that I would not otherwise have been all this time without assuring you of my tenderness and begging you for that you have always shown me.
I cannot help telling you about my son, who is very well; he would be rather pretty if he did not have an eruption, but I am in hopes when we get to Fontainebleau he will have no more of it.
April 25, 1705.
I cannot, my dear grandmother, be longer without comforting myself with you in the sorrow that has befallen me [death of her son]. I am convinced that you have felt it, for I know the affection you have for me. If we did not take all the sorrows of this life from God, I do not know what would become of us. I think He wants to draw me to Him, by overwhelming me with every sort of grief. My health suffers greatly, but that is the least of my troubles.
I have received one of your letters, my dear grandmother, which gave me great pleasure; the assurances of your affection bring me consolation. I have great need of it in my present state. Adieu; I write so slowly that the shortest letters take me a great deal of time.
[At the close of the year 1703 her father, Vittorio Amadeo, had entered the alliance against France; the battle of Ramillies was fought May 23, 1706, and the French were defeated at Turin September 7 of the same year.]