When the Dauphin was lying sick of the small-pox, I went on the Wednesday to the King.
He said to me, sarcastically, "You have been frightening us with the great pain which Monseigneur would have to endure when the suppuration commences; but I can tell you that he will not suffer at all, for the pustules have already begun to dry."
I was alarmed at this, and said, "So much the worse; if he is not in pain his state is the more dangerous, and he soon will be."
"What!" said the King, "do you know better than the doctors?"
"I know," I replied, "what the small-pox is by my own experience, which is better than all the doctors; but I hope from my heart that I may be mistaken."
On the same night, soon after midnight, the Dauphin died.
SECTION XV.—THE DUKE OF BURGUNDY, THE SECOND DAUPHIN.
He was quite humpbacked. I think this proceeded from his having been made to carry a bar of iron for the purpose of keeping himself upright, but the weight and inconvenience of which had had a contrary effect. I often said to the Duke de Beauvilliers he had very good parts, and was sincerely pious, but so weak as to let his wife rule him like a child. In spite of his good sense, she made him believe whatever she chose. She lived upon very good terms with him, but was not outrageously fond, and did not love him better than many other persons; for the good gentleman had a very disagreeable person, and his face was not the most beautiful. I believe, however, she was touched with his great affection for her; and indeed it would be impossible for a man to entertain a more fervent passion than he did for his wife. Her wit was agreeable, and she could be very pleasant when she chose: her gaiety dissipated the melancholy which sometimes seized upon the devout Dauphin. Like almost all humpbacked men, he had a great passion for women; but at the same time was so pious that he feared he committed a grievous sin in looking at any other than his own wife; and he was truly in love with her. I saw him once, when a lady had told him that he had good eyes, squint immediately that he might appear ugly. This was really an unnecessary trouble; for the good man was already sufficiently plain, having a very ill-looking mouth, a sickly appearance, small stature, and a hump at his back.
He had many good qualities: he was charitable, and had assisted several officers unknown to any one. He certainly died of grief for the loss of his wife, as he had predicted. A learned astrologer of Turin, having cast the nativity of the Dauphine, told her that she would die in her twenty-seventh year.
She often spoke of it, and said one day to her husband, "The time is approaching when I shall die; you cannot remain without a wife as well on account of your rank as your piety; tell me, then, I beg of you, whom you will marry?"