he is worse, and all the medicines given are
powerless. At this the king sets out, the
Court following as it best can, huddled into
any coach that comes first to hand, and
careless, for the moment, of precedence or
etiquette. The king waited during the
night at Saint Cloud, his brother slowly
sinking; when, finding that all hope was at
an end, he quitted the palace and returned
to Marly, the Court scrambling after him.
And then the dying man was deserted by all.
Stretched on a couch in his cabinet, he was
left only to the scullions and footmen, who
filled the air with their cries, "the women
running here and there, crying, with dishevelled
hair, like bacchantes." The Duchesse de
la Ferté, who had married her daughter to
one of Monsieur's minions, came back to
look at him as he lay yet palpitating, "Pardi!
here is a daughter well married!" said she,
bitterly, turning on her heel. The next day,
all traces of sorrow were banished. Songs,
games, cards, dice, gay dresses, laughter:
all was just the same at Marly as before.

Monseigneur, the king's eldest son, heir to
the throne, father of the Duc de Bourgogne,
and slave to La Choin, takes the small-pox.
The king and Madame de Maintenon go to
him at his own place, Meudon, and Monsieur
and Madame de Bourgogne hold their court
at Versailles. Saint Simon, absent from
court on business, hears of Monseigneur's
illness, and hurries back—torn between the
hope that he will die and the fear that, though
a fat man of fifty, he may recover. Things
seem to go well for Monseigneur. The small-
pox declares itself, and progresses favourably.
The Dames de la Halle, who are very fond of
him, come in procession to congratulate him
on his recovery, kiss the foot of his bed, and
say they will order a Te Deum to be sung.
Monseigneur thanks them, says the Te Deum
would be premature, gives them money and
a dinner, and sends them away. The Duchesse
d'Orléans and Saint Simon bewail together
their evil fate, and wonder how so gross a
man can survive so sharp an illness. But
Monseigneur's recovery was factitious. In a
few days he becomes unconscious, sinks
rapidly, and dies. As Madam de Saint
Simon is undressing, and just ready to get
into bed, rumours of the event reach
Versailles. Saint Simon rushes off to the Duc
de Berri's, but finds that everyone has
gathered round the heirs—the Bourgognes.
It was a curious sight. The whole Court,
scarcely dressed, was huddled into Madame
de Bourgogne's chamber.

The two sons (De Bourgogne and De
Berri) and their wives sat side by side,
on a sofa in the midst of the saloon, the
Court ranged around them. The Duc and
Duchesse de Bourgogne were calm and gently
sorrowful, not unmindful that they were
advanced a step nearer to the throne by a
father's death; but the Duc de Berri, the
youngest and the favourite son, wept and
howled like some wild animal. They were
not sobs, but appalling yells, that burst from
him. His wife, who had lost her protector,
was as bad. The decorous sympathy of the
poor Duchesse de Bourgogne was lost in such
a tumult of grief. "She found extreme
difficulty in keeping up appearances. When
the prince her brother-in-law howled, she
blew her nose. She had brought some tears
along with her, and kept them up with care;
and these, combined with the art of the
handkerchief, enabled her to redden her
eyes and make them swell, and smudge her
face." In the midst of all this, in wandered
Madame, Monsieur's widow—" in full-dress
she knew not why, howling she knew not
why, and furnishing the odd spectacle of a
princess putting on her robes of ceremony in
the dead of night to come and cry among a
crowd of women with but little on except
their night-dresses; almost as masqueraders."
In the gallery, a few ladies—notably the
Duchesses d'Orleans and Saint Simon—sat
near a tent-bed, talking confidentially, and
confessing their joy at the event. These
tent-beds were placed in the gallery every
night for the Swiss Guards. In the midst of
the conversation, one of the ladies touched
the bed, when a sturdy arm reared itself up,
undrew the curtains, and showed them a
brawny Swiss under the sheets, half awake
and wholly bewildered. When he made out
his position, and understood that these
undraped women were princesses or peeresses,
he dived back beneath the sheets and the
curtains; and the ladies had much trouble not
to laugh too loudly for a Court supposed to
be in deep affliction.

At last, the Duc de Berri was obliged to
be carried off howling to bed; where he lay
all night in a state of hysterical delirium.
Monsieur and Madame de Bourgogne invited
a number of ladies to pass the night in their
bedroom. They slept, with unclosed
curtains, a calm and unbroken sleep, and the
next morning rose early, " their tears quietly
dried up."

Monseigneur had been very popular with the
Parisians, and his death was much lamented;
but, if Saint Simon's portrait is a faithful
one, he was no great loss to the country.
Idle, credulous, and prejudiced, "absorbed in
his fat and his ignorance," avaricious even to
penury, obstinate and stupid, "without any
desire to do ill, he would have made a
pernicious king." So that, though his death
wrought some grief and a little state
perplexity, France, under the regency of the
Duc d'Orleans, was in better keeping than
she would have been if she had ever passed
into the hands of La Choin's fat friend.