de ——­ that I should acquaint Madame with the affair, who would, no doubt, feel very grateful for the communication.  He then added, “Tell Madame la Marquise that my wife is very clever and very intriguing.  I adore her, and should run distracted were she to be taken from me.”  I lost not a moment in acquainting Madame with the affair and gave her the letter.  She became serious and pensive, and I since learned that she consulted M. Berrier, Lieutenant of Police, who, by a very simple but ingeniously conceived plan, put an end to the designs of this lady.  He demanded an audience of the King, and told him that there was a lady in Paris who was making free with His Majesty’s name; that he had been given the copy of a letter, supposed to have been written by His Majesty to the lady in question.  The copy he put into the King’s hands, who read it in great confusion, and then tore it furiously to pieces.  M. Berrier added, that it was rumoured that this lady was to meet His Majesty at the public ball, and, at this very moment, it so happened that a letter was put into the King’s hand, which proved to be from the lady, appointing the meeting; at least, M. Berrier judged so, as the King appeared very much surprised on reading it, and said, “It must be allowed, M. le Lieutenant of Police, that you are well informed.”  M. Berrier added, “I think it my duty to tell Your Majesty that this lady passes for a very intriguing person.”  “I believe,” replied the King, “that it is not without deserving it that she has got that character.”

Madame de Pompadour had many vexations in the midst of all her grandeur.  She often received anonymous letters, threatening her with poison or assassination:  her greatest fear, however, was that of being supplanted by a rival.  I never saw her in a greater agitation than, one evening, on her return from the drawing-room at Marly.  She threw down her cloak and muff, the instant she came in, with an air of ill-humour, and undressed herself in a hurried manner.  Having dismissed her other women, she said to me, “I think I never saw anybody so insolent as Madame de Coaslin.  I was seated at the same table with her this evening, at a game of brelan, and you cannot imagine what I suffered.  The men and women seemed to come in relays to watch us.  Madame de Coaslin said two or three times, looking at me, Va tout, in the most insulting manner.  I thought I should have fainted, when she said, in a triumphant tone, I have the brelan of kings.  I wish you had seen her courtesy to me on parting.”  “Did the King,” said I, “show her particular attention?” “You don’t know him,” said she; “if he were going to lodge her this very night in my apartment, he would behave coldly to her before people, and would treat me with the utmost kindness.  This is the effect of his education, for he is, by nature, kind-hearted and frank.”  Madame de Pompadour’s alarms lasted for some months, when she, one day, said to me, “That haughty Marquise has missed