LETTERS TO MADAME DE GRIGNAN[11] FROM 1671 TO 1690.

LETTERS TO MADAME DE GRIGNAN[11] FROM 1671 TO 1690.

LETTER I.

Paris, Monday, February 9, 1671.

I receive your letters in the same way in which you received my ring. I am in tears while I read them. My heart seems ready to burst. Bystanders would think that you had treated me ill in your letters, or were sick, or that some accident had happened to you; whereas every thing is the reverse. You love me, my dear child; you love me, and you tell me so in a manner that makes my tears flow in torrents. You continue your journey without any disagreeable accident.[12] To know this, is the thing I could the most desire; and yet am I in this deplorable condition! And do you then take a pleasure in thinking of me? in talking of me? and have more satisfaction in writing your sentiments to me than in telling them? In whatever way they come, they meet with a reception, the warmth of which can only be known to those who love as I do. In expressing yourself thus, you make me feel the greatest tenderness for you that is possible to be felt; and if you think of me, be assured that I, on my side, am continually thinking of you. Mine is what the devotees call an habitual thought; it is what we ought to have for the Divine Being, were we to do our duty. Nothing is capable of diverting me from it. I see your carriage continually driving on, never, never to come nearer to me; I fancy myself on the road, and am always in apprehensions of the carriage overturning. I am almost distracted at the violent rains we have had the last three days, and am frightened to death at the thoughts of the Rhône. I have at this instant a map before me; I know every place you sleep at. To-night you are at Nevers, Sunday you will be at Lyons, where you will receive this letter. I could only write to you at Moulins by Madame de Guenegaud. I have had but two letters from you; perhaps a third is on the road; they are my only comfort. I ask for no other. I am utterly incapable of seeing much company at a time; I may recover the feeling hereafter, but it is out of the question now. The Duchesses of Verneuil and Arpajon have used all their endeavors to divert me, for which I am much obliged to them. Never, surely, were there better people than in this country. I was all the day on Saturday at Madame de Villars,[13] talking of you, and weeping; she takes a great share in my sorrow. Yesterday I heard Monsieur d’Agen[14] preach, and was at Madame de Puisieux and Madame du Pui-du-Fou’s, who both send you a thousand remembrances. This evening I shall sup tête-à-tête[15] in the Fauxbourgs. These are my carnivals. I have a mass said for you every day. This is no superstitious devotion. I have seen Adhémar[16] but for a moment; I am going to write to him and thank him for his bed, for which I am more obliged to him even than you are. If you would give me real pleasure, take care of your health, sleep in that little snug bed, eat broth, and exert that courage which I want. Continue to write to me. The friendships you left behind you here are all increased, and I should never have done with compliments if I were to tell you how much every one is concerned about your health.

LETTER II.

Paris, Wednesday, February 11, 1671.

I have received but three of those delightful letters that so affect my heart. One is still on the road. If I were not so fond of them, and loth to lose any thing that you write me, I should not think I had lost much; for nothing can be wished for beyond what I find in those I have already received. In the first place, they are well written, and are besides so tender, so natural, that it is impossible not to believe every thing contained in them. Distrust itself would here stand convinced. They wear that air of truth which, as I have always maintained, carries authority with it; while falsehood and lies skulk under a load of words, without having the power of persuasion; the more they attempt to show themselves, the more they are entangled. Your expressions are sincere, and they appear so; they are used only to explain your meaning, and receive an irresistible force from their noble simplicity. Such, my dear child, do your letters appear to me. As for me, I appear to myself quite divested of every thing that made me agreeable; I am ashamed to appear in society; and notwithstanding the endeavors that have been used to bring me back to it, I have latterly been like one just come out of the woods; nor could I be otherwise. Few are worthy of understanding what I feel; I have sought those chosen few, and avoided all others. I fancy you are at Moulins to-day; if so, you will receive one of my letters. I did not write to you at Briare; if I had, it must have been on that cruel Wednesday, the very day you set off; and I was so overwhelmed with grief that I was incapable even of tasting the consolation of writing to you. This is the third letter; my second is at Lyons. Be sure you let me know if you receive them. When at a distance, we no longer laugh at a letter beginning with, “I received yours,” etc. The thought of your going still further and further from me, and of seeing the carriage continually driving on, is what harrows me most. You are always going on, and at last, as you say, you will find yourself at two hundred leagues’ distance from me; resolved, therefore, not to suffer such injustice without repaying it in my turn, I shall set myself about removing further off, too, and shall do it so effectually as to make it three hundred. A very pretty distance you will say. And would it not be a step highly worthy the love I have for you, to undertake to traverse all France to find you out? I am delighted at the reconciliation between you and the coadjutor; you know how necessary I always thought it to the happiness of your life. Preserve this treasure with care. You own yourself charmed with his goodness: let him see you are not ungrateful. I shall soon finish my letter; perhaps when you get to Lyons you will be so giddy with the honors you will receive there, that you will not find time to read it; find enough, however, I beseech you, to let me hear of you, and whether you embark upon that horrible Rhône.

Wednesday night.

I have this moment received yours from Nogent; it was given me by a very honest fellow, whom I questioned as much as I could; but your letter is worth more than any thing that could have been told me. It was but justice, my dear, that you should be the first to make me smile, after having caused me so many tears. What you tell me of Monsieur Busche is quite original; it is what may be called a genuine stroke of eloquence. I did laugh then, I own, and I should have been ashamed of it had I done any thing else than cry for this week past. I met this Monsieur Busche in the street, when he was bringing your horses for you to set out; I stopped him, and all in tears asked him his name, which he told me. “Monsieur Busche,” said I, sobbing all the while, “I recommend my daughter to your care; do not, dear Monsieur Busche, do not overturn her; and when you have taken her safely to Lyons, if you will call upon me with the agreeable news, I will give you something to drink.” I shall, therefore, certainly do so. What you say of him has greatly added to the respect I had for him before.

LETTER III.

Paris, Thursday, February 12, 1671.

This is only a line precursory, for I shall not write to you till to-morrow; but I wish you to know what I have just heard.

Yesterday the president, Amelot, after having made a great number of visits, toward night found himself a good deal out of order, and was soon afterward seized with a violent apoplectic fit, of which he died about eight o’clock this morning. I would have you write to his wife; the whole family are in the greatest affliction.

The Duchess de la Vallière sent a letter to the king, the contents of which have not transpired, and then a message by the Marshal de Bellefond, to say, “that she would have quitted the court, after having lost the honor of his good opinion had she been able to prevail with herself to see him no more, but that her weakness on that head had been so great that she was scarcely capable, even now, of making a sacrifice of it to her God; she was resolved, however, that the remains of the passion she had felt for him should constitute part of her penance, and, as she had devoted her youth to him, it could not be thought much if the rest of her life were spent in cares for her own salvation.” The king wept bitterly, and sent Monsieur Colbert to Chaillot, to beg her to come directly to Versailles, that he might speak to her once more. Monsieur Colbert accordingly conducted her thither. The king had a whole hour’s conversation with her, and wept a great deal. Madame de Montespan ran with open arms, and tears in her eyes, to receive her. We do not rightly understand all this. Some say she will remain at Versailles, and continue about the court; others that she will return to Chaillot. We shall see.

LETTER IV.

Paris, Tuesday, March 3, 1671.

If you were here, my dear child, you would certainly laugh at me. I am set down to write beforehand, but from a very different reason to that which I once gave you for writing to a person two days before I could send my letter: it was a matter of indifference to me, when I wrote, as I knew I should have no more to say to him at the two days’ end than I had then. But here the case is otherwise. I do it now from the regard I have for you, and to satisfy the pleasure I take in writing to you every moment, which is the sole comfort I have now left. To-day I am shut up by myself in my room, through excess of ill-humor. I am weary of every thing. I took a pleasure in dining here, and still a greater one in writing to you out of season. Alas! you have none of these leisure moments! I write quite at my ease, but can hardly suppose you will be able to read what I write in the same manner. I do not see how it is possible for you to be a minute by yourself. On one side I behold a husband who adores you, who is never tired of being with you, and who scarcely knows the end of his happiness; on the other side, harangues, compliments, visits, and honors paid you without end; all this must be answered. Indeed, you have enough upon your hands. I could not bear it myself in my little circle. But what became of your favorite Indolence amid all this noise and bustle? It suffers now; it retires into a corner, just dead with apprehension of losing its place in your heart forever; it seeks some vacant moment to put you in remembrance, and just drop a word to you by the by. “Alas!” it says, “and have you then forgotten me? Remember, I am your oldest acquaintance; the friend that has never abandoned you; the faithful companion of your happy hours, who made you amends for the want of every pleasure, and for whose sake you have sometimes hated them. It was I that prevented your dying of the vapors while you were in Brittany. Sometimes, indeed, your mother would break in upon our joys, but then I knew where to have you again. Now I know not what will become of me. These shows, all this pageantry, will be my death, unless you take some care of me.” Methinks I hear you speak a kind word to it as you go by; you give it some hopes of possessing you when at Grignan; but you are gone in an instant, and can not find time to say more. Duty and reason are with you, and allow you not a moment’s repose; I, who have always so highly honored these personages, am now quite out with them, and they with me. How then will they permit you to waste your time in reading such trifles as these? I assure you, my dear child, I am continually thinking of you; and I experience every day the truth of what you once told me, that there are certain thoughts which are not to be dwelt upon, but passed over as lightly as possible, unless we would be forever in tears. This is my case: for there is not a place in the house which does not give a stab to my heart when I see it; but your room especially deals a deadly blow from every part of it. I have placed a screen in the middle of it, that I may at least take something from the prospect. As for the window from which I saw you get into D’Hacqueville’s coach, and then called you back again, I shudder every time I think how near I was throwing myself out of it after you. I was likely enough to have done it, for at times I am not in my senses. The closet where I held you last in my arms, without knowing what I did; the Capuchins, where I used to go to mass; the tears that fell so fast from my eyes that they wetted the ground, as if water had been thrown on it; Saint Mary’s, Madame de la Fayette, my return to the house, your room, that night, the next morning, your first letter, and every one since, and still every day, and every conversation of those who feel with me, are so many remembrancers of my loss. Poor D’Hacqueville holds the first rank; I shall never forget the compassion he showed me. These are the thoughts incessantly uppermost; yet these are to be passed over, it seems; we are not to abandon our selves to our thoughts, and the emotions of our heart. I had rather, however, continue my reveries on the kind of life you are leading. It occasions a sort of diversion, without making me abandon my principal, my beloved object. I do then think of you. I am always wishing for letters from you. One wish of this nature, when gratified, is followed by another continually. I am in this state of expectation now, and shall go on with my letter when I have received one from you.

LETTER V.

Paris, Wednesday, March 18, 1671.

I have received two packets at once, which have been delayed for a considerable time. By these I am at length informed from yourself, of your entry into Aix, but you do not mention whether your husband was with you, or in what manner Vardes honored your triumph; but you describe the triumph itself very humorously, as well as the embarrassment you were under, and your many misplaced civilities. I wish that I had been with you; not that I should have done better than yourself, for I have not so good a gift of fixing names upon faces—on the contrary, I daily commit a thousand blunders in that way—but I think I could have been of some assistance to you, at least I should have made courtesies enough. It is true, that such a multiplicity of ceremonies and attentions is very tiresome. You should, nevertheless, endeavor not to be deficient in any of these points, but accommodate yourself, as much as possible, to the customs and the manners of those among whom you are to live.

An event has just taken place, which engrosses the whole conversation of Paris. The king has ordered Monsieur de S—— to resign his post, and to quit Paris immediately. Can you guess the reason? For having cheated at play, and won upward of five hundred thousand crowns with false cards! The man who made these cards was examined by the king himself; he denied the fact at first; but, upon his majesty’s promising him a pardon, he confessed that he had followed the trade for a long time. It is said that the affair will not stop here, for that there are several houses which he used to furnish with these cards. It was some time before the king could prevail upon himself to disgrace a man of Monsieur de S——’s quality; but as, for several months past, every body that had played with him had been in a manner ruined, he thought he could not in conscience do less than bring such a scene of villainy to light. S—— was so perfectly master of his adversaries’ game, that he always made sept et le va upon the queen of spades, because he knew the spades lay all in the other packs. The king as constantly lost one-and-thirty upon clubs, and used to say, clubs never win against spades in this country. This man had given thirty pistoles to Madame de la Vallière’s valets de chambre to throw all the cards they had in the house into the river, in the pretense that they were not good, and had introduced his own card-maker. He was first led into this fine way of life by one Pradier, who has since disappeared. Had S—— known himself innocent, he would immediately have delivered himself up, and insisted upon taking his trial; but, instead of this, he took the road to Languedoc, as the surest way of the two; many, however, advised him to take a journey to La Trappe,[17] after such a misfortune.

Madame d’Humieres has charged me with a thousand good wishes for you. She is going to Lille, where she will receive as many honors as you did at Aix. Marshal Bellefond, through a pure motive of piety, has settled with his creditors. He has given up to them the principal part of his property, besides half the profits of his post,[18] to complete the payment of the arrears. This is a noble action, and shows that his visits to La Trappe have not been without effect. I went the other day to see the Duchess of Ventadour; she was as handsome as an angel. The Duchess of Nevers came in, with her head dressed very ridiculously. You may believe me, for you know I am an admirer of fashion. Martin had cropped her to the very extremity of the mode.

Your brother is at St. Germain; he divides his time with Ninon, a young actress,[19] and, to crown the whole, Despréaux. We lead him a sad life.

LETTER VI.

Paris, Friday, April 1, 1671.

I returned yesterday from St. Germain with Madame d’Arpajon. Every one at court inquired after you; among the rest, it will not be amiss, I think, to distinguish the queen, who accosted me, and asked how my daughter was after her affair upon the Rhône. I returned her majesty thanks for the honor she did you in remembering you. She then desired me to tell her in what manner you had like to have been lost; I accordingly gave her an account of your crossing the river in a storm of wind, and that a sudden gust had thrown you under an arch, within an inch of one of the piles, which if you had once touched, all the world could not have saved you. But, says the queen, “Was her husband with her?” “Yes, madam, and the coadjutor too.” “Really,” said she, “they were greatly to blame.” She gave two or three alasses! while I was talking to her, and said many obliging things of you. Afterward a number of ladies came in, and among the rest the young Duchess of Ventadour, very fine and very handsome; it was some time before they brought her the divine tabouret;[20] “Ah,” said I, turning to the grand master,[21] “why do they not give it to her, she has purchased it dearly enough?”[22] He was of my opinion. In the midst of a silence in the circle, the queen turned to me, and asked me who my granddaughter was like? “M. de Grignan, madam,” replied I. Upon which her majesty exclaimed, “Indeed! I am sorry for it;” and added, in a low tone of voice, “She had better have resembled her mother or grandmother.” So you see how much I am indebted to you in making my court. Marshal Bellefond made me promise to distinguish him from the crowd. I made your compliments to Monsieur and Madame Duras, and to Messieurs de Charôt and Montausier, and tutti quanti, not to forget the dauphin and mademoiselle, who both talked a great deal to me about you. I likewise saw Madame de Ludre; she accosted me with an excess of civility and kindness that surprised me, and talked in the most affectionate manner of you, when all on a sudden, as I was going to make her a suitable answer, I found she was not attending to me, and saw her fine eyes wandering round the room. I presently perceived it, and those who saw I took notice of it were pleased with me, and could not help laughing.

I have been extremely diverted with our hurly-burly headdresses; some of them looked as if you could have blown them off their shoulders. Ninon[23] said that La Choiseul was as like the flaunting hostess of an inn, as one drop of water to another; a most excellent simile! But that Ninon is a dangerous creature; if you only knew how she argues upon religion it would make you shudder. Her zeal to pervert the minds of young people is much the same as that of a certain gentleman of St. Germain, that we saw once at Livri. She says your brother has all the simplicity of the dove, that he is just like his mother; but that Madame de Grignan has all the fire of the family, and has more sense than to be so docile. A certain person would have taken your part, and put her out of conceit with you on that head, but she bid him hold his tongue, and told him that she knew more of the matter than he did. What a depravity of taste! Because she knows you to be handsome and witty, she must needs saddle you with the other qualification, without which, according to her rule, there is no being perfect. I am greatly concerned for the harm she does my son in this point; but do not take any notice of it to him. Madame de la Fayette and I use all our endeavors to disengage him from so dangerous an attachment. Besides her, he has a little actress,[24] and all the players of the town upon his hands, to whom he gives suppers; in short, he is perfectly infatuated. You know what a joke he makes of Mascaron. I fancy your Minim[25] would suit him. I never read any thing more diverting than what you wrote to me about that man; I read it to Monsieur de la Rochefoucault, who laughed heartily at it. He desires me to tell you, that there is a certain apostle who is running up and down after his rib, which he would fain appropriate to himself, as a part of his goods and chattels; but, unluckily for him, he is not clever at enterprise. I fancy Mellusina is fallen into some pit, we do not hear a single word about her. M. de la Rochefoucault says besides, that if he was only thirty years younger, he should certainly have a great inclination for M. de Grignan’s third rib.[26] That part of your letter, where you say he has already had two of his ribs broken, made him laugh heartily; we always wish for some oddity or other to divert you, but we very much doubt whether this has not turned out rather more to your satisfaction than ours. After all, we pity you extremely, in not having the word of God preached in a suitable manner. Ah, that Bourdaloüe! his sermon on the Passion was, they say, the most perfect thing of the kind that can be imagined; it was the same he preached last year, but revised and altered with the assistance of some of his friends, that it might be wholly inimitable; how can one love God, if one never hears him properly spoken of? you must really possess a greater portion of grace than others. We went the other day to hear the Abbé Montmort;[27] I never heard a prettier sermon for so young a beginner. I wish you had such a one in the room of your Minim. He made the sign of the cross, and gave out his text; he did not anathematize his audience, he did not load us with abuse; he told us not to be under any apprehensions concerning death, since it was the only passage we had to a glorious resurrection with Jesus Christ. We agreed with him in this, and every one went away contented. He has nothing offensive in his manner; he imitates Monsieur d’Agen without copying him; he has a modest confidence, is learned, and pious. In short, I was highly pleased with him.

LETTER VII.

Paris, Friday, April 10, 1671.

I wrote to you on Wednesday by the post, yesterday by Magalotti, and to-day again by the post; but last night I lost a charming opportunity. I went to walk at Vincennes, en Troche,[28] and by the way met with a string of galley-slaves; they were going to Marseilles, and will be there in about a month. Nothing could have been surer than this mode of conveyance, but another thought came into my head, which was to go with them myself. There was one Duval among them, who appeared to be a conversible man. You will see them when they come in, and I suppose you would have been agreeably surprised to have seen me in the midst of the crowd of women that accompany them. I wish you knew of what importance the words Provence, Marseilles, Aix, are become to me; even the Rhône, that devilish Rhône, and Lyons, are something to me. Brittany and Burgundy appear like places under the pole, in which I take no sort of interest. I may say with Coulanges, “O, the surprising power of my orvietan!” Really, my child, it was admirable in you to desire the abbé[29] to prevent my sending you any more presents! What nonsense! Do I in reality make you any? You call the newspapers I send you by that name. You never can divest me of the desire of thus giving; it is the most sensible pleasure I can enjoy. You should rather rejoice with me, if I indulged myself more frequently in it. The method you took of thanking me was highly pleasing to me.

Your letters are excellent; one might venture to say they were not dictated by the good ladies of the country where you reside. I find that M. de Grignan, to his other connections with you, adds that of being your companion; he seems to me the only one who understands you. Be careful to preserve the happiness of his heart by the tenderness of yours, and consider that if you do not both love me, each according to your proper degree of estimation, you will be the most ungrateful of beings. The new opinion, that there is no such thing as ingratitude in the world, appears to me, for the reasons which we have so frequently discussed, like the philosophy of Descartes, and the contrary one like that of Aristotle. You know the deference I always paid to the authority of the latter; it is the same with respect to my opinion of ingratitude. I should pronounce you then, my child, to be a little ungrateful wretch; but, happily, and the idea constitutes all my comfort, I know you to be incapable of such conduct, and I therefore yield without reserve to the feelings of my heart. Adieu, my dearest love, I am going to close this letter. I shall write you another to-night, in which I shall give you an account of the occurrences of the day. We are every day in hopes of letting your house; you may suppose I can forget nothing that relates to you; I am as interested in your affairs as the most selfish being ever was in his own.

LETTER VIII.

Friday night, April 10, 1671.

I make up my packet at Monsieur de la Rochefoucault’s, who embraces you very heartily; he is delighted with your answer about the canons and Father Desmares. There is some pleasure in sending you these trifles, you answer them so prettily. He begs you to be assured that you still live strongly in his remembrance, and that if he hears any thing worth your notice he will certainly communicate it to you. He is at his Hôtel de Rochefoucault, having no longer any hopes of recovering the use of his feet; he talks of going to the waters; I am for sending him to Digne, others to Bourbon. I dined en Bavardin[30] and in so complete a style that I thought we should have died. We did not talk, merely, as we used to do; we did nothing but chatter.

Brancas was overturned the other day into a ditch, where he found himself so much at his ease, that he asked those who came to help him out if they had any occasion for his services. His glasses were all broken, and his head would have been so, too, if he had not been more lucky than wise; but all this did not seem to have destroyed his reverie in the least. I wrote this morning to let him know he had been overturned, and was very near breaking his neck, as I supposed he was the only person in Paris who was ignorant of it; and that I took the opportunity of expressing the concern it gave me. I expect his answer.

LETTER IX.

From Monsieur De la Rochefoucault’s, Friday evening, April 24, 1671.

Here, then, I make up my packet. I had intended to tell you that the king arrived yesterday evening at Chantilly: he hunted a stag by moonlight; the lamps did wonders; the fire-works were a little eclipsed by the brightness of our serene friend, the moon; but the evening, the supper, and the entertainment, went off admirably well. The weather we had yesterday gave us hopes of an end worthy of so fine a beginning. But what do you think I learned when I came here? I am not yet recovered, and hardly know what I write. Vatel, the great Vatel, late maître-d’hôtel to M. Fouquet, and in that capacity with the prince, a man so eminently distinguished for taste, and whose abilities were equal to the government of a state—this man, whom I knew so well, finding, at eight o’clock this morning, that the fish he had sent for did not come at the time he expected it, and unable to bear the disgrace that he thought would inevitably attach to him, ran himself through with his own sword. Guess what confusion so shocking an accident must have occasioned. Think, too, that perhaps the fish might come in just as he was expiring. I know no more of the affair at present, and I suppose you think this enough. I make no doubt the consternation was general; it must be very disagreeable to have so fatal an event break in upon an entertainment that cost fifty thousand crowns.

Monsieur De Menars is to be married to Mademoiselle De la Grange-Neuville; but I do not know how I can have the heart to speak to you about any thing but Vatel.

LETTER X.

Paris, Sunday, April 26, 1671.

This is Sunday, April 26th, and this letter will not go out till Wednesday; but it is not so much a letter as a narrative that I have just learned from Moreuil, of what passed at Chantilly with regard to poor Vatel. I wrote to you last Friday that he had stabbed himself—these are the particulars of the affair: The king arrived there on Thursday night; the walk, and the collation, which was served in a place set apart for the purpose, and strewed with jonquils, were just as they should be. Supper was served, but there was no roast meat at one or two of the tables, on account of Vatel’s having been obliged to provide several dinners more than were expected. This affected his spirits, and he was heard to say, several times: “I have lost my honor! I can not bear this disgrace!” “My head is quite bewildered,” said he to Gourville. “I have not had a wink of sleep these twelve nights; I wish you would assist me in giving orders.” Gourville did all he could to comfort and assist him; but the failure of the roast meat (which, however, did not happen at the king’s table, but at some of the other twenty-five), was always uppermost with him. Gourville mentioned it to the prince, who went directly to Vatel’s apartment, and said to him: “Every thing is extremely well conducted, Vatel; nothing could be more admirable than his majesty’s supper.” “Your highness’s goodness,” replied he, “overwhelms me; I am sensible that there was a deficiency of roast meat at two tables.” “Not at all,” said the prince; “do not perplex yourself, and all will go well.” Midnight came: the fire-works did not succeed, they were covered with a thick cloud; they cost sixteen thousand francs. At four o’clock in the morning Vatel went round and found every body asleep; he met one of the under-purveyors, who was just come in with only two loads of fish. “What!” said he, “is this all?” “Yes, sir,” said the man, not knowing that Vatel had dispatched other people to all the sea-ports around. Vatel waited for some time; the other purveyors did not arrive; his head grew distracted; he thought there was no more fish to be had. He flew to Gourville: “Sir,” said he, “I can not outlive this disgrace.” Gourville laughed at him. Vatel, however, went to his apartment, and setting the hilt of his sword against the door, after two ineffectual attempts, succeeded in the third, in forcing his sword through his heart. At that instant the carriers arrived with the fish; Vatel was inquired after to distribute it. They ran to his apartment, knocked at the door, but received no answer, upon which they broke it open, and found him weltering in his blood. A messenger was immediately dispatched to acquaint the prince with what had happened, who was like a man in despair. The duke wept, for his Burgundy journey depended upon Vatel. The prince related the whole affair to his majesty with an expression of great concern; it was considered as the consequence of too nice a sense of honor; some blamed, others praised him for his courage. The king said he had put off this excursion for more than five years, because he was aware that it would be attended with infinite trouble, and told the prince that he ought to have had but two tables, and not have been at the expense of so many, and declared he would never suffer him to do so again; but all this was too late for poor Vatel. However, Gourville attempted to supply the loss of Vatel, which he did in great measure. The dinner was elegant, the collation was the same. They supped, they walked, they hunted; all was perfumed with jonquils, all was enchantment. Yesterday, which was Saturday, the same entertainments were renewed, and in the evening the king set out for Liancourt, where he had ordered a media-noche;[31] he is to stay there three days. This is what Moreuil has told me, hoping I should acquaint you with it. I wash my hands of the rest, for I know nothing about it. M. D’Hacqueville, who was present at the scene, will, no doubt, give you a faithful account of all that passed; but, because his hand-writing is not quite so legible as mine, I write too; if I am circumstantial, it is because, on such an occasion, I should like circumstantiality myself.

LETTER XI.

Monday, May 18, 1671 Just going to set out.

At last, my dear child, I am just ready to step into my carriage: there!—I am in—adieu! I never shall use that word to you without real grief. I am now on my way for Brittany. Is it possible that any thing can increase the distance between us, when we are already separated from each other more than two hundred leagues? But so it is; I have found a way to complete it; and as you thought your town of Aix not quite far enough from me, I also, look upon Paris as too much in your neighborhood. You went to Marseilles to fly me, and I, to pay you in your own coin, am going to Vitré. But to be serious, my dear, our correspondence will suffer by this; it used to be a great source of consolation and amusement to me. Alas! what shall I have to say to you from the midst of my woods? I shall have nothing to entertain you with but accounts of Mademoiselle du Plessis and Jaquine;[32] charming subjects these! I am very happy in what you tell me of your health, but, in the name of God, if you have any love for me, take care of yourself; do not dance, do not fall, take a good deal of rest, and, above all things, arrange your plans so as to lie-in at Aix, where you may have the best and the most timely assistance. You know how expeditious you are on those occasions; be sure to have every thing ready rather too soon than too late. Good Heavens! what shall I not suffer at that period!

You relate the dispute you had with our friend Vivonne very agreeably. I think the fault lies entirely on his side. You laid a famous trap in which you caught him completely. His confusion made me sweat for him, and he did so himself, I dare say; but in the end you made it up and embraced him! a great[33] undertaking that, for one in your situation. If your quarrels must end thus, you ought to have no quarrels nor enemies upon your hands.

LETTER XII.

From the Rocks,[34] Sunday, May 31, 1671.

At last, my child, I am at the Rocks. Can I behold these walks, can I view these ornaments, this little closet, these books, these rooms, and not die with grief? Some recollections are agreeable, but there are others again so lively and so tender that they are hardly supportable; such are mine with respect to you. And you may easily guess the effect this is likely to produce in a heart like mine.

If you continue pretty well, my dear child, I believe I shall not come to you till next year. Brittany and Provence are not very compatible; long journeys are strange things. If we were always to continue in the same mind we are in at the end of a journey, we should never stir from the place we were then in; but Providence, in kindness to us, causes us to forget it. It is much the same with lying-in women. Heaven permits this forgetfulness that the world may be peopled, and that folks may take journeys to Provence. Mine, therefore, will afford me the greatest joy I ever received in my life, but how cruel a thought is it to see no end to your stay there! I more and more admire and applaud your prudence, though, to tell you the truth, I am greatly affected with this impossibility; but I hope time will make us see things in a different light. We must always live in hope; without that consolation there would be no living. I sometimes pass such melancholy moments in the woods, that I return as changed as one just out of a fever. I fancy you pass your time pretty well at Marseilles. Do not fail to tell me how you were received at Grignan. The people here had designed to make a kind of triumphal entry for my son; Vaillant had drawn out near fifteen hundred men under arms, very well dressed, with new ribbons round their necks, and had marched them within a league of the Rocks. But guess what happened! Our abbé had written word that we should be there on Tuesday, and afterward forgot to mention it to us. Accordingly these poor people were waiting under arms the whole day till ten o’clock at night, when they returned home very much chagrined at their disappointment; and behold the next day, which was Wednesday, we came in as quiet and peaceable as lambs, without dreaming that a little army had been drawn out to receive us! We were a good deal vexed at this mistake, but there was no remedy; so much for our first setting out. Mademoiselle du Plessis is just as you left her. She has formed a new acquaintance at Vitré that she plumes herself mightily upon, because she is a great genius, has read all the romances, and, more than that, has had two letters from the Princess de Tarante. I was wicked enough to set Vaillant upon telling her that I was jealous of this new friend of hers, and that, when I heard of their intimacy, it had given me the greatest uneasiness, though I had taken no notice of it to her. It requires the pen of a Molière to describe all she says upon the occasion; and it is highly amusing to see how artfully she manages me, and with what care she avoids speaking of my supposed rival before my face; I too play my part very well. My little trees are grown surprisingly; Pilois[35] is raising their stately heads to the clouds. In short, nothing can be more beautiful than these walks, which you first saw planted. You may remember I once gave you a little device which was thought very suitable. Here is a motto I wrote the other day upon a tree, which I intend for my son, who is just returned from Candia. Vago di fama.[36] Is it not pretty, notwithstanding its conciseness? Yesterday I had another inscribed in honor of the idlers, Bella cosa far niente![37] Ah! my dear child, what a wild romantic air my letters have! What is become of the time when I used to talk of Paris like other people? Now you will hear of nothing but myself; and, to show you what confidence I have in your affection, I am persuaded this will be the most agreeable intelligence I can give you. I am highly pleased with my company here. Our abbé is at all times an excellent companion. La Mousse and my son are satisfied with me, and I with them. We always seek one another; and if business at any time takes me from them, they are at their wit’s end, and think it very odd in me to prefer a farmer’s account to a tale of La Fontaine’s. They are all passionately in love with you. I fancy you will hear from them soon. I choose however to be beforehand with them, for I do not love talking to you in a crowd. My dearest child, will you always love me? my life depends upon your affection! That, as I told you the other day, constitutes all my joy and all my sorrow.

LETTER XIII.

The Rocks, Wednesday, June 10, 1671.

I am going to entertain you to-day, my dear child, with what is called rain and fine weather. I had not your letters till Friday, and I answered them the Sunday following. I begin then with the rain, for fair weather is out of the question. For this week past it has rained incessantly; I say incessantly—for the rain has only been interrupted by storms. I can not stir abroad, my workmen are all dispersed, and I am devoured with melancholy; La Mousse, too, is very low-spirited. We read, indeed, and that just keeps us alive. My son is gone to Rennes, whither we thought it necessary to send him, to pay a visit to the first president, and several other friends that I have there; if he has time, I shall prevail on him to go and see Monsieur de Coëtquen; he is old enough now for these things. There was a ball at Vitré again on Sunday. I very much fear that my son will become too fond of the company of ten or a dozen men that supped with him the other night at the castle of Sévigné; they may be borne with, but he should be very cautious of forming too great an intimacy with them. A dispute arose between two of the party about some trifle or other; the lie was given; to it they went; the company endeavored to part them; there was a great deal of talk and very little sense; however, monsieur le marquis[38] had the honor of making up the difference, and afterward set out for Rennes. There have been great cabals at Vitré: Mademoiselle de Croqueoison complains that, at a ball the other day, Mademoiselle du Cerni did not offer her part of some oranges she had. We must hear what Mademoiselle du Plessis and the Launayes have to say on this subject, as they know all the circumstances relating to it. As to Mademoiselle du Plessis, she lets all her affairs at Vitré run to ruin, because she will not stir in them, from the fear of making me jealous on account of her new friend; and it was but the other day that, to make me quite easy, she said as many ill-natured things of her as she could. When it is fine weather, this nonsense makes me laugh, but when it is bad and gloomy, I could give her a box on the ear, as you once did. Madame de Coulanges writes me word that she has heard nothing of Brancas, except that out of his six coach-horses he has only one left, and that he was the last person to discover it. I hear no news. Our little Alégre is at her mother’s, and it is thought that M. de Seignelai is to be married to her. I suppose you are in want of persons to furnish you with intelligence; for my part, I despise trivial occurrences; I am only for those that surprise and astonish; such a one I met with this very morning while the abbé and I were in his study together. We found, in reckoning with those counters of his which are so good, that with all that has fallen to me, I ought to be worth 530,000 livres.[39] Do you know that what our dear abbé has left me will not amount to less than 80,000 francs? And do you think I am not impatient to be in possession? And 100,000 francs from Burgundy; this has come since you were married, the rest, viz.: 100,000 crowns by my marriage; 100,000 crowns since by M. de Chalons, and 20,000 francs, in little legacies, from one or two of my uncles; but do you not wonder whither my pen is running with me? I should do much better to tell you what I suffer every day, when I reflect in what places Providence has destined us to pass our lives. This is a continual source of uneasiness to me, but let it not be so to you; you have not the same reason; you are with a husband that adores you, and in the midst of honors and splendor; but endeavor, if possible, to work some miracle in your affairs, so that your return to Paris may be retarded only by the duties of your post, and not from necessity. It is very easy to talk thus; I wish it was as easily carried into execution, and wishes are not forbidden us. They write me word that Madame de Valavoire is at Paris, and that she is forever talking of your beauty, politeness, wit, talents, and, in short, of the new head-dress you have invented, which it seems you have executed in as good a style as if you had been in the midst of the court. Madame de la Troche and I have at least the honor of having described it so well as to put you in the way of performing these wonders. She is at Paris still, that La Troche. She is going to her own house about the latter end of this month. As for me, I do not know what the States intend doing; but I fancy I shall run away for fear of being ruined. It is a mighty pretty thing to put myself to the expense of near a thousand crowns in dinners and suppers, and all for the honor of keeping a summer-house for M. and Madame de Chaulnes, Madame de Rohan, M. de Lavardin, and half Brittany, who, without knowing any thing of me, will, to be in the fashion, honor me with their company. Well, we shall see how it will turn out. I shall only regret leaving M. d’Harroüis and this house, before I have half finished my business. But, my dear child, the greatest inclination I have at present is to be a little religious. I plague La Mousse about it every day. I belong neither to God nor to the devil. I am quite weary of such a situation, though, between you and me, I look upon it as the most natural one in the world. I am not the devil’s, because I fear God, and have at the bottom a principle of religion; then, on the other hand, I am not properly God’s, because his law appears hard and irksome to me, and I can not bring myself to acts of self-denial; so that altogether I am one of those called lukewarm Christians, the great number of which does not in the least surprise me, for I perfectly understand their sentiments and the reasons that influence them. However, we are told that this is a state highly displeasing to God; if so, we must get out of it. Alas! this is the difficulty. Was ever any thing so mad as I am, to be thus eternally pestering you with my rhapsodies? My dear child, I ask excuse, as they say here; but I must chat with you, it is so truly delightful to me. Be sure, however, not to return me an answer, only let me hear of your health, with a little spice of your sentiments, that I may see that you are happy, and that you like Grignan; that is all. Love me; though we have turned the world into ridicule, it is natural, it is good.

LETTER XIV.

The Rocks, Sunday, June 28, 1671.

You have amply made up to me my late losses; I have received two letters from you which have filled me with transports of joy. The pleasure I take in reading them is beyond all imagination. If I have in any way contributed to the improvement of your style, I did it in the thought I was laboring for the pleasure of others, not for my own. But Providence, who has seen fit to separate us so often, and to place us at such immense distances from each other, has repaid me a little for the privations in the charms of your correspondence, and still more in the satisfaction you express in your situation, and the beauty of your castle; you represent it to me with an air of grandeur and magnificence that enchants me. I once saw a similar account of it by the first Madame de Grignan; but I little thought, at that time, that all these beauties were one day to be at your command. I am very much obliged to you for having given me so particular an account of it. If I could be tired in reading your letters, it would not only betray a very bad taste in me, but would likewise show that I could have very little love or friendship for you. Divest yourself of the dislike you have taken to circumstantial details. I have often told you, and you ought yourself to feel the truth of this remark, that they are as dear to us from those we love, as they are tedious and disagreeable from others. If they are displeasing to us, it is only from the indifference we feel for those who write them. Admitting this observation to be true, I leave you to judge what pleasure yours afford me. It is a fine thing, truly, to play the great lady, as you do at present. I perfectly comprehend Monsieur de Grignan’s feelings in seeing you so much admire his castle; had you appeared insensible, or even indifferent, on the occasion, it would have given him a chagrin that I can conceive better perhaps than any other; and I share in the pleasure he has in seeing you pleased. There are some hearts which sympathize for each other so truly, that they judge by themselves what others feel. You do not mention Vardes[40] often enough to me, nor poor Corbinelli. Was it not very agreeable to you to be able to speak their language? How goes on Vardes’ love for the fair T——? Tell me whether he is much hurt by the infinite length of his banishment, or whether his philosophy, and a little dash of misanthropy, can support his heart against these vicissitudes of love and fortune. The books you read are well chosen. Petrarch must certainly give you a good deal of pleasure, especially with the notes you have. Those of Mademoiselle de Scuderi on some of his sonnets, rendered them very agreeable. As for Tacitus, you know how much I was charmed with it, when we read it together here; and how often I used to interrupt you, to make you observe the periods, where I thought the harmony particularly striking. But if you stop half way I shall scold you; it will be doing great injustice to the dignity of the subject, and I shall say to you, as a certain prelate did to the queen mother, “This is history; you know what stories are already.” A reluctance, in this respect, is only pardonable in romances, which I know you do not like. We read Tasso with pleasure, and I am a pretty good proficient in the language, from the excellent masters I have had. My son makes La Mousse read Cleopatra,[41] and I listen to him, whether I will or not, and am amused. My son is going to Lorraine; we shall be very dull in his absence. You know how it vexes me to see the breaking up of an agreeable party, and how transported I am when I see a train of carriages driving off that have wearied me to death for a whole day; upon which we made this just observation, that bad company is more desirable than good. I recollect all the odd things we used to say when you were here, and all you said yourself, and all you did; your idea never leaves me; and then again, on a sudden, I think where you are; my imagination represents to me an immense space, and a great distance; on a sudden your castle bounds the prospect, and I am displeased at the walls that inclose your mall. Ours is surprisingly beautiful, and the young nursery is delightful. I take pleasure in rearing their little heads to the clouds, and frequently, without considering consequences or my own interest, cut down large trees, because their shade incommodes my young ones. My son views all these proceedings, but I do not allow him to interfere. Pilois[42] continues to be a very great favorite with me, and I prefer his conversation to that of many who have the title of chevalier in the parliament of Rennes. I am grown rather more negligent than you; for the other day I let a coachful of the Fouesnelle family go home through a tremendous rain, for want of pressing them with a good grace to stay; but I could not get the compliment to pass my lips. It was not the two young women, but the mother, and an old woman from Rennes, and the two sons. Mademoiselle du Plessis is exactly as you represent her, only if possible, more impertinent. What she says and does every day to keep me from being jealous, is perfectly original, and I am quite provoked, sometimes, that I have nobody to laugh at it with me. Her sister-in-law is very pretty, without being ridiculous, and speaks Gascon in the midst of Brittany. I think you are very happy in having Madame de Simiane[43] with you; she has a fund of knowledge that will relieve you from all kinds of restraint; this is a great deal. You will have, too, a very agreeable companion in her.

I now return to you, that is, to the divine fountain of Vaucluse! How beautiful! Well might Petrarch make such frequent mention of it! But, remember, I shall some day see all these wonders with my own eyes; I, who have such a veneration for antiquities. I shall certainly be transported with them, and the magnificence of Grignan. The abbé will find employment enough there. After the Doric orders and splendid titles of your house, nothing is wanting but the order you are going to establish there; for, let me tell you, without something substantial at the bottom, all is bitterness and anxiety. I have great pity for those who ruin themselves; it is the only affliction in life that is felt alike by all, and which is increased, instead of being diminished, by time. I have frequent conversations on this subject with a certain friend of ours. If he has a mind to benefit by them, he has had opportunity enough to lay in a good stock, and of such a nature he need not forget them. I am glad that you are to have two of your brothers-in-law with you this autumn. I think you have planned your journey well. We can travel a great way without being fatigued, provided we have something to amuse us by the way, and do not lose our courage. The return of fine weather has brought all my workmen back again, which is a great amusement to me. When I have company, I work at that fine altar-piece you saw me drawing when you were at Paris; when I am alone, I read, I write, or am with the abbé in his closet upon business. I wish him with you sometimes, but it is for two or three days only.

I consent to the commerce of wit which you propose. The other day I made a maxim off-hand, without once thinking of it, and I liked it so well that I fancied I had taken it out of M. de la Rochefoucault’s. Pray tell me whether it is so or not, for in that case my memory is more to be praised than my judgment. I said, with all the ease in the world, that “ingratitude begets reproach, as acknowledgment begets new favors.” Pray where did this come from? Have I read it? did I dream it? is it my own idea? Nothing can be truer than the thing itself, nor than that I am totally ignorant how I came by it. I found it properly arranged in my brain, and at the end of my tongue. As for that sentence, “bella cosa far niente,” you will not think it so dull when I tell you it is intended for your brother: remember last winter’s disaster. Adieu, my dearest child; take care of yourself, continue handsome, dress well, amuse yourself, and take proper exercise. I have just been writing to Vivonne,[44] about a captain of a troop of Bohemians, whose confinement I have begged him to render as easy as possible, without detriment to the king’s service. You must know that there was among the troop of Bohemians[45] that I was mentioning to you the other day, a young girl who danced extremely well, and put me very much in mind of your manner. I was pleased with her. She begged me to write to Provence in favor of her grandfather. “Where is he?” said I. “He is at Marseilles,” said she, with as much composure and unconcern as if she had said, “He is at Vincennes.” He was a man of singular merit, it seems, in his way;[46] in short, I promised her to write about him; I immediately thought of Vivonne. I send you my letter; if you are not sufficiently upon terms with him to allow of my jesting with him, you may burn it; if it is an ill-written letter you may burn it; but if you are friendly with his corpulency, and my letter will save you the trouble of writing one, seal it and send it to him. I could not refuse this request to the poor girl, and to the best-danced minuet that I have seen since the days of Mademoiselle de Sévigné. She had just your air, was about your height, has good teeth, and fine eyes. Here is a letter of so enormous a length that I can easily forgive your not reading it through. Monsieur de Grignan can not conceive how one can possibly read such long letters; but, in good earnest, can you read them in a day?

LETTER XV.

The Rocks, Sunday, July 5, 1671.

It is a great proof of your love, my dear child, that you can bear with all the nonsense I send you from hence. You defend Mademoiselle de Croqueoison extremely well. In return, I assure you there is not a single word in your letters that is not dear to me. I am afraid to read them for fear of ending them, and if it were not for the consolation that I can read them over as often as I please, I should make them last much longer; but then, on the other hand, my impatience makes me ready to devour them. What should I do if your writing was as illegible as D’Hacqueville’s? Would the greatness of my affection help me to decipher it? Really, I am afraid not; but I have heard of such instances. In short, I greatly esteem D’Hacqueville, and yet I can not accustom myself to his handwriting; I never can read his letters; I hunt out word by word; I puzzle myself with guessing at them; I say one word for another, and at last, when I can make neither head nor tail of it, away I fling the letter in a rage. But I tell you this as a secret, for I would not have him know that his letters give me all this trouble. He thinks, poor man, his hand is like print; but you, who know the contrary, tell me how you manage. My son set out yesterday, greatly concerned at parting with us. I endeavored to inspire him with every good, just, and noble sentiment that I was mistress of, and to confirm all the good qualities I had remarked in him. He received my advice with all imaginable sweetness and marks of approbation; but you know the weakness of human nature; I leave him, therefore, in the hands of Providence, reserving to myself the comfort of having nothing to reproach myself with in regard to him. As he has a fund of wit and humor, we shall necessarily miss him extremely. We are going to begin a moral treatise of Nicole’s. If I were at Paris I would send it to you; I am sure you would admire it. We continue to read Tasso with pleasure. I am almost afraid to tell you that I am returned to Cleopatra; and, by good fortune, the short memory I have makes it still pleasing to me. I have a bad taste, you will say; but you know I can not affect a prudery which is not natural to me, and as I am not yet arrived at a time of life that forbids the reading such works, I suffer myself to be amused with them, under the pretense that my son brought me into it. He used to read us some chapters, too, out of Rabelais, which were enough to make us die with laughing; in return, he seemed to take a good deal of pleasure in talking with me; and, if he is to be believed, he will remember what I have said to him. I know him well, and can often discern good sentiments through all the levity of his conversation. If he is dismissed this autumn, we shall have him again.

I have mentioned Launaye to you; she was bedaubed the other day like a twelfth-day taper; we thought she resembled the second volume of a sorry romance, or the Romance of the Rose, exactly. Mademoiselle du Plessis is always at my elbow; when I read the kind things you say of her, I am as red as fire. The other day La Biglesse played Tartuffe to the life. Being at table, she happened to tell a fib about some trifle or other, which I noticed, and told her of it; she cast her eyes to the ground, and with a very demure air, “Yes, indeed, madam,” said she, “I am the greatest liar in the world; I am very much obliged to you for telling me of it.” We all burst out a-laughing, for it was exactly the tone of Tartuffe: “Yes, brother, I am a wretch, a vessel of iniquity.” She attempts sometimes to be sententious, and gives herself airs of understanding which sit still worse upon her than her own natural way. There! I think you know every thing about the Rocks.

LETTER XVI.

The Rocks, Sunday, July 12, 1671.

I have received but one letter from you, my dear child, which vexes me; I used generally to have two. It is a bad thing to use one’s self to such dear and tender cares as yours; there is no being happy without them. If M. de Grignan’s brothers come to you this summer, they will be good company for you. The coadjutor has been a little indisposed, but is now perfectly recovered; he is incredibly lazy, and is the more to blame, as he can write extremely well when he sets about it. He has a great regard for you, and intends visiting you about the middle of August—he can not before. He protests, but I believe it is false, that he has no branch to rest upon, which hinders him from writing, and makes his eyes ache. This is all I know about Seigneur Corbeau. How odd it is of me to tell you all this, when I do not know myself how I stand with him! If you should know any thing of the matter, pray inform me. I reflect every hour of the day upon the times when I used to see you always about me, and am perpetually regretting the loss of those happy moments. Not that I can reproach my heart with having been insensible of the pleasure of your company; for I solemnly protest to you, I never looked on you with the indifference or coolness that grows upon long acquaintance; no, I can not reproach myself with that. What I regret is, that I did not see you so constantly as I could now wish I had, but suffered cruel business sometimes to tear me from you. It would be a fine thing to fill my letters with what fills my heart; alas! as you say, we should glide over many thoughts, without seeming to regard them. Here then I rest, and conjure you, if I am at all dear to you, to be particularly careful of your health. Amuse yourself, do not study too much, carry yourself safely through your pregnancy; after that, if M. de Grignan really loves you, and is resolved not to kill you outright, I know what he will do, or rather what he will not do.

Have you cruelty enough not to finish Tacitus? Can you leave Germanicus in the midst of his conquests? If you really intend to serve him so paltry a trick, let me know where you leave off, and I will finish for you, which is all I can do to serve you at present. We have gone through Tasso, and with a great deal of pleasure; we found beauties in him, that are unknown to those who are only half read in the language. We have begun our morality,[47] it is of much the same nature as Pascal’s. Talking of Pascal, I have taken into my head to almost adore those gentlemen, the postillions who are incessantly carrying our letters backward and forward. There is not a day in the week, but they bring one either to you or to me; there is one every day, and every hour of the day, upon the road. Kind-hearted people, how obliging it is of them! What a charming invention is the post, and what a happy effect of Providence is the desire of gain! I sometimes think of writing to them to show my gratitude; and I believe I should have done it before, had I not remembered that chapter in Pascal, and been afraid that they might have perhaps thought proper to thank me for writing to them, as I thanked them for carrying my letters. Here is a fine digression for you. But to return to our reading. It was without prejudice to Cleopatra that I laid a wager I would read it through; you know how I support my wagers. I often wonder how I could like such ridiculous stuff; I can hardly comprehend it. You may perhaps remember enough of me to know how much a bad style displeases me; that I have some taste for a good one, and that no person is more sensible to the charms of eloquence. I well know how wretched La Calprenedre’s style is in many places, on account of its long-winded periods, and bad choice of words. I wrote a letter to your brother in that style the other day, which was pleasant enough. However, though I find such glaring faults in Calprenedre, though I know how detestable that way of writing is, yet I can not leave it. The beauty of the sentiments, the violence of the passions, and the miraculous success of their redoubtable swords, entices me away like a child; I become a party in all their designs, and if I had not the example of M. de la Rochefoucault and D’Hacqueville to comfort me, I should be ready to hang myself for being guilty of such a weakness. You appear before me, and cry “Shame!” yet still I go on. I shall have great honor in being intrusted by you with the care of preserving you in the abbé’s friendship. He loves you tenderly; you are often the subject of our conversation, with your state, your grandeur, and so forth. He would not willingly die without having first taken a trip to Provence, and rendered you some service. I am told, that poor Madame de Montluet is on the point of losing her senses; she has been raving hitherto without once shedding a tear, but now she has a violent fever, and begins to cry. She says she will be damned, since her dear husband is inevitably so. We go on with our chapel. The weather is very hot; but the mornings and evenings are delightful in the woods, and under the shade of the trees before the house. My apartment is extremely cool. I am afraid you suffer from the heat in Provence.

LETTER XVII.

The Rocks, Wednesday, August 19, 1671.

You describe very humorously the disorder my perfumed paper occasioned you. Those who saw you read my letters must have thought I was dead, and could never imagine that they contained nothing but chit-chat. I am very far from correcting myself in the way you imagined. I shall always run into extremes in what is for your good, if it depends on me. I already began to think that my paper might do you harm, but I did not intend to change it till about November. However, I begin from this day, and for the future you will have nothing to guard against but the smell.

You have a tolerable number of the Grignans with you; the Lord deliver you from the aunt,[48] I feel her troublesome even here. The chevalier’s sleeves must have had a curious effect at table; but though they draw every thing along with them, I much question whether they would draw me; fond as I am of fashion, I have a great aversion to slovenliness. Vitré would be a famous place for him. I think I never saw such profusion before. There is not a table at court that can come up to the meanest of the twelve or fifteen that are constantly kept up here; and, indeed, there is occasion for all this, for there are no less than three hundred people to be provided for, who have nowhere else to eat. I left this good town last Monday, after having made your compliments to Mme. de Chaulnes and Mme. de Murinais. Nothing could be more cordially received, or more warmly returned. All Brittany was drunk on that day. We dined apart. Forty gentlemen dined in a lower room, each of whom drank forty toasts; the king’s was the first, and then the glasses were broken. All this was done under pretense of extreme joy and gratitude for a hundred thousand crowns which his majesty had remitted out of the free gift the province had made him, as a recompense for their having so cheerfully complied with his request. So now there is only two millions two hundred thousand livres, instead of five hundred thousand. The king, too, has written a letter with his own hand, full of the kindest expressions to his good province of Brittany. This letter the governor read to the States assembled, and a copy of it was registered. Upon this they shouted Vive le roi! and immediately fell to drinking; and drink they did, God knows! M. de Chaulnes did not forget the gouvernante of Provence; and a Breton gentleman going to toast you by your name, and not well remembering it, got up, and, in a loud voice, exclaimed, “Here is to Madame de Carignan.” This ridiculous mistake made M. de Chaulnes laugh till the tears came into his eyes. The Bretons drank it, thinking it was right; and, for a week to come, you will be nothing but Madame de Carignan; some called you the Countess of Carignan. This was the state of things when I left them.

I have shown Pomenars what you say of him. He is highly delighted with it; but I assure you he is so hardened and impudent, that once or twice in a day he makes the first president leave the room, to whom he is a mortal enemy, as well as to the procurator-general. Madame de Coëtquen had just received the news of the death of her little girl, and fainted away. She is in great affliction, and says she shall never have so pretty a one. Her husband is quite inconsolable; he is just returned from Paris, after having made matters up with Le Bordage. This was a most extraordinary affair; he has transferred all his resentments to M. de Turenne.[49] I suppose you know nothing of this, but it fell unintentionally from my pen. There was a pretty ball on Sunday. We saw a girl of Lower Brittany who, they said, bore away the palm. She was the most ridiculous creature I ever saw, and threw herself into such attitudes as made us die with laughing. But there were other dancers, both men and women, that were really admirable.

If you ask me how I like my Rocks after all this hurry, I shall tell you that I am delighted to be here again. I shall stay for a week or ten days at least, in spite of their endeavors to get me back. I want rest more than I can describe to you. I want to sleep; I want to eat, for I am starved at these fêtes. I want the fresh air; I want silence, for I was attacked on all sides, and my lungs were almost worn out with talking. In short, my dear, I found our abbé, La Mousse, my dog, my mall, Philois, and my masons, all as I left them, and they are the only things that can do me any good in my present condition.

LETTER XVIII.

The Rocks, Sunday, August 23, 1671.

You were with the president of Charme’s lady, then, when you wrote to me. Her husband was the intimate friend of Monsieur Fouquet. Am I right in this? In short, my dear, you were not alone; and M. de Grignan acted wisely in making you leave your closet to entertain your company. He might, however, have spared his capuchin’s beard, though he did not appear much the worse for it in your eyes, for when he was at Livri, with his bushy tuft,[50] you thought him handsomer than Adonis. I often repeat these four verses with admiration. It is surprising what an impression the remembrance of any particular time makes upon the mind, whether good or bad. Sometimes I think of that delicious autumn; and then again, when I reflect on the latter part of it, I sweat with horror;[51] yet we ought to be thankful to Providence, who delivered you out of the danger you were in.

Your reflections upon the death of M. de Guise are admirable; they have made me plow up my mall with my eyes; for it is there I meditate with most pleasure. Poor La Mousse has been afflicted with the tooth-ache, so that for a long time I have walked alone till night, and thought of—God knows what I have not thought of. Do not be under apprehensions of my growing weary of solitude: set aside the ills that arise from my own heart, and against which I have not strength to struggle, and I am not to be pitied in any respect. I am of a happy temper; I can accommodate myself to, and be pleased with any thing; and I prefer my retirement here to all the noise and pageantry of Vitré. I have been here a week, and the tranquillity I have enjoyed has cured me of a dreadful cold. I have drank nothing but water; have talked very little; have left off suppers; and by this method, without having shortened my walks, I am quite well again. Madame de Chaulnes, Madame de Murinais, Madame Fourché, and a very fine girl from Nantes, came here last Thursday. Madame de Chaulnes told me, as she came into my room, that she could exist no longer without seeing me; that she had the weight of all Brittany upon her shoulders, and should die with fatigue. She then flung herself upon my bed; we sat round her, and she was fast asleep in a minute, from mere fatigue, though we continued talking. At last she awoke, highly charmed with the ease and freedom we enjoy at the Rocks. We then took a walk. Afterward she and I sat down to rest ourselves in the center of the wood, and while the rest were diverting themselves at mall, I made her tell me how she came to marry M. de Chaulnes; for I always love to fish out something by way of amusement; but in the midst of our entertainment there came on just so treacherous a shower like the one you may remember at Livri, that we were nearly drowned. The water ran from our clothes in streams; it came through the trees in a moment, and we were instantly wet to the skin. We ran as fast as we could, some screaming, others sliding, others falling. At last we got in, a roaring fire was made, we changed our dress from head to foot, I furnishing the whole wardrobe. We dried our shoes, and were ready to die with laughing all the while. In this manner was the gouvernante of Brittany treated in her own government. After this we had a slight repast, and then the poor woman left us, more vexed, I dare say, at the part she had to play when she got home, than at the affront she had received here. She made me promise to relate this adventure to you, and to come and assist her to-morrow in entertaining the States, which will break up in about a week. I engaged to do both; of the one I now acquit myself, and of the other I shall acquit myself to-morrow, as I can not help showing her this civility.

LETTER XIX.

The Rocks, Wednesday, September 16, 1671.

I am wicked to-day, my child. I am just in the same humor as when you used to say, “You are wicked.” I am very dull and spiritless: I have not heard from you. “Warm affections are never tranquil;” a maxim. It rains; we are quite alone; in short, I wish you a pleasanter day than I am likely to have. What greatly perplexes the abbé, La Mousse, and the rest of my party, is, that there is no remedy for the evil. I want it to be Friday, that I may have a letter from you, and it is but Wednesday. This puzzles them. They do not know what to do for me in this case, for if, in the excess of their friendship, they were to assure me it was Friday, that would be still worse; for if I had not a letter from you then, I should be lost to all reason. I am obliged to have patience; though patience, you know, is a virtue that I am not much in the habit of practising; but I shall be easy before three days have passed. I am very anxious to know how you are after your alarm. These alarms are my aversion; for though I am not with child myself, they make me become so, that is, they put me in a condition that entirely destroys my health. However, my uneasiness does not at present reach so far; for I am persuaded you have been prudent enough to keep your bed, and that will have set all matters right again. Do not tell me, that you will not let me know any thing about your health; that would make me desperate, and having no longer any confidence in what you say, I should be always in the way I am in at present. We are, it must be owned, at a fine distance from each other, and if either of us had any thing upon the mind that required immediate relief, we should have plenty of time to hang ourselves in.

I thought it necessary yesterday to take a small dose of morality, and I found myself a great deal the better for it; and still more so for a little criticism on the Bérénice of Racine, which I thought very diverting and ingenious. It is by the author[52] of the sylphs, gnomes, and salamanders. There are a few words which are not quite so good as they should be, and even unbecoming a man who knows the world; these grate the ear; but, as they occur only here and there, they ought not to prejudice us against the whole, which, I assure you, upon examination, I found a very well-written critique. As I fancied this trifle would have diverted you, I heartily wished for you by my side in the closet, provided you could return again to your magnificent castle as soon as you had read it. And yet I own I should have felt some pain in letting you go so soon. I know too well what the last parting cost me. It would partake of the humor I have just been complaining of. I can not think of it even now without shuddering; but you are safe from this inconvenience. I hope this letter will find you cheerful; if so, I beg you will burn it directly, for it would be very extraordinary if it should be agreeable to you, considering the horrid humor I write it in. It is very happy for the coadjutor that I do not answer his letter to-day.

I have a great inclination to ask you a thousand questions by way of finishing this performance worthily. Have you many grapes? you tell me only of figs. Is the weather very hot? you do not say a word about it. Have you such charming cattle as we have at Paris? Has your aunt D’Harcourt been with you long? You see that, having lost so many of your letters, I am quite ignorant how matters stand, and have entirely lost the thread of your discourse. Ah! how I long to beat somebody! and how much I should be obliged to any Breton that would come and say something very silly, to put me in a passion! You told me the other day that you were glad I was returned to my solitude that I might think of you. Very pretty that! as if I did not think sufficiently of you in every other place. Farewell, my dear—this is the best part of my letter. I finish, because I think I talk foolishly, and I must preserve my credit.

LETTER XX.

The Rocks, Wednesday, Sept. 30, 1671.

I believe the Leonic opinion is now the most ascertained. He understands the subject completely, can tell whether matter reasons or not, what kind of intelligence God has given to the brute creation, with other subjects that occupied his thoughts. You may perceive by this that I suppose him in heaven, O che spero![53] He died on Monday morning; I was then at Vitré and saw him, but I wish I had not seen him. His brother seems inconsolable; I invited him to my woods that he might weep at liberty, but he told me he was too deeply afflicted to seek consolation. The poor bishop was only five and thirty years of age; he was well provided for, and had an admirable taste for science; this was, in fact, the cause of his death, as it was of Pascal’s—he wore himself out with study. You are not much interested in this detail; but it is the news of the place, and you must, therefore, bear with it. Death, in my opinion, is the concern of every one, and its consequences strike home to our bosoms.

I read M. Nicole with a degree of pleasure that lifts me above the earth. I am particularly charmed with his third treatise on the means of preserving peace and harmony among mankind. Read it, I beseech you, and with attention; you will see how clearly he develops the intricacies of the human heart, in which every sect is alike included—philosophers, Jansenists, Molinists, in short, all mankind: this may truly be called searching to the bottom of the heart with a lantern. He discovers to us sensations that we feel daily, but which we have neither the wit to comprehend nor the sincerity to acknowledge. In a word, I never read any thing like it, except Pascal. Were it not for the amusement of our books we should be moped to death for want of employment. It rains incessantly. I need say no more to make you conceive how dull our situation is. But you who enjoy a sunshine which is so much the object of my envy, how do I pity you to be torn from Grignan, while the weather is delightful, in the middle of autumn, and from an agreeable society, and all this to be shut up in a little dirty town! I can not bear the idea. Could not M. de Grignan have put off the assembly a little longer? Is he not master in this respect? And poor Coulanges, what will become of him? Our recluse mode of life has so turned our brains that we make matters of consequence of every thing. Receiving and answering letters takes up some of our time, indeed, but we have always enough left upon our hands. You make our abbé proud by the kind things you say of him in your letters. I am satisfied with him on your account. As for La Mousse, he catechises Sundays and holidays; he is resolved to go to heaven. I tell him it is only out of curiosity, to see whether the sun is a heap of dust, continually in motion, or a globe of fire. The other day he assembled all the children of the village about him, and was catechising them, but after several questions they had so confounded things, that when he asked them who the Blessed Virgin was, they all with one accord answered, “The Creator of heaven and earth.” His faith was not shaken by the children, but finding the men and women, and even the old people, all in the same story, he began to doubt, and at length joined in the opinion; in short, he did not know what he was about, and if I had not luckily come to his aid he would never have got out of the scrape. This new opinion would certainly have been productive of more mischief than that of the motion of atoms. Farewell, my dear child, you see we tickle ourselves in order to laugh, to so low an ebb are we reduced.

LETTER XXI.

The Rocks, Wednesday, October, 7, 1671.

You know I am always carried away by what I read, so that it is for the interest of those I converse with, that I should read none but the best books. I can think of nothing at present but M. Nicole’s Moral Reflections. His treatise on the means of preserving peace among men, delights me. I never met with any thing so truly practical, yet so full of fire and imagination. If you have not yet read it, I beg you will. If you have read it, read it again with additional attention. For my part, I think all mankind are included in it. I am persuaded it was made for me, and hope to profit by it; at least I shall endeavor to do so. You know I could never bear the old saying, “I am too old to mend;” I could much sooner pardon the young for saying, I am too young. Youth is in itself so amiable, that were the soul as perfect as the body, we could not forbear adoring it; but when youth is past, it is then we ought to think of improvements, and endeavor to supply the loss of personal charms by the graces and perfections of the mind. I have long made this the subject of meditation, and am determined to work every day at my mind, my soul, my heart, and my sentiments. I am full of this at present, and therefore fill my letter with it, having besides nothing of greater consequence to tell you.

I suppose you are at Lambesc, but I can not see you clearly from hence; there is a mist about my imagination that conceals you from my sight. I had formed an idea of Grignan, I saw your apartment, used to walk upon your terrace, and went to mass at your beautiful church. But now I am quite at a loss; I wait with great impatience for intelligence from your new quarters. I will write no more to-day, though I have a great deal of time upon my hands; for I have nothing but trifles to tell you, which would be an affront to the lady-lieutenant of a province, who is holding the States, and, consequently, has weighty affairs upon her hands. It may do well enough when you are in your little palace of Apollo. Our abbé and La Mousse are very much yours; and I, my dear child, need I tell you what I am, or what you are to me?

LETTER XXII.

The Rocks. Wednesday, November 4, 1671.

Let us talk of M. Nicole, it is a long time since we have said a word about him. There is a great deal of justice in your observation respecting the indifference he requires us to show to the opinion of the world; I think with you, that philosophy will hardly be found sufficient of itself, without the assistance of grace. He lays so great a stress on preserving peace and good fellowship with our neighbor, and recommends so many things to us in order to attain these, that it is next to an impossibility, after this, to be indifferent to what the world thinks of us. Guess what I am doing; I am beginning this treatise again—methinks I could wish to swallow it, like Ezekiel’s roll. I am delighted with what he says on the subject of pride and self-love, which enter into all disputes, under the feigned name of the love of truth. In short, this treatise will apply to more than one in the world; but I can not help thinking that he had me principally in view when he wrote it. He says, eloquence, and a flow of words, give a luster to the thoughts. I greatly admire that expression; I thought it beautiful and new. The word luster is extremely apposite there, do you not think so? We must read this book together at Grignan. I pass my time in having masses said for you every day, and in a multitude of disagreeable thoughts, which can be of no service to you, but which, however, it is impossible to avoid. I have at present ten or twelve workmen in the air, raising the timbers of our chapel. They run backward and forward upon the outside of it like so many rats; they hold by nothing, and are every instant in danger of breaking their necks, and make my back ache with endeavoring to help them below. One can not but admire the wonderful effects of Providence in the desire of gain, and be thankful such people are created, who are willing to do for a shilling what others would not do for a hundred thousand pounds. “O, thrice happy they who plant cabbages! when they have one foot on the ground, the other is not far off.” I have this from a very good author.[54] We have planters too with us, who are forming new avenues. I hold the young trees myself while they set them in the ground, unless it rains so that there is no being abroad; but the weather almost drives me to despair, and makes me wish for a sylph to transport me to Paris. Madame de la Fayette says, that since you tell the story of Auger in so serious a manner, she is persuaded nothing can be more true, and that you are by no means jesting with me. She thought at first that it had been a joke of Coulanges’, and it looks very like it. If you write to him upon the subject, pray let it be in that style.