Her life was a mere senseless dream of femme galante, a luxurious revel, a constant whirl of pleasures, and extravagance in jewelry, silks, gems, etc.  A service in silver was no longer rich enough—­she had one in solid gold.  To house all her gems of art, rare objects, furniture, she caused to be constructed a temple of art, “Luciennes,” one of the most sumptuous, exquisite structures ever fitted out.  The money for this was supplied by the controleur general, the Abbe Ferray, whose politics, science, duty, and aim in life consisted in never allowing Mme. du Barry to lack money.  All discipline, morality, in fact everything, degenerated.

She had no rancor or desire for vengeance; she never humiliated those whom she could destroy; she always punished by silence, yet never won eternal silence by letters patent; generous to a fault, giving and permitting everything about her to be taken, she opened her purse to all who were kind to her and to all who happened in some way to please her.  Keeping the heart of Louis XV. was no easy matter, as the case of Mme. de Pompadour clearly showed.  The majority of his friends and her enemies endeavored to force a new mistress upon the king; surrounded on all sides by candidates for her coveted position, Mme. du Barry managed to hold her own.  When the king was prostrated by smallpox, he sent her away on the last day.

The reign of Mme. du Barry was not one of tyranny, nor was it a domination in the strict sense of that word; for she was a nonentity politically, without ideas or plans.  “Study the favor of Mme. du Barry:  nothing that emanates from her belongs to her; she possesses neither an idea nor an enemy; she controls all the historical events of her time, without desiring them, without comprehending them....  She serves friendships and individuals, without knowing how to serve a cause or a system or a party, and she is protected by the providential course of things, without having to worry about an effort, intrigues, or gratitude.”

Her power and influence cannot be compared with those of her predecessor, Mme. de Pompadour.  Modes were followed, but never invented by her.  “With her taste for the pleasures of a grisette, her patronage falls from the opera to the couplet, from paintings and statuaries to bronzes and sculptures in wood; her clientele are no longer artists, philosophers, poets—­they are the gods of lower domains, mimics, buffoons, dancers, comedians.”  She was the lowest and most common type of woman ever influential in France.

After the death of the king, she was ordered to leave Versailles and live with her aunt.  Later on, she was permitted to reside within ten leagues of Paris; all her former friends and admirers then returned, and she continued to live the life of old, buying everything for which she had a fancy and living in the most sumptuous style, never worrying about the payment of her debts.  After a few years she was entirely forgotten, living at Luciennes with but a few intimate friends and her lover, the Duc de Brissac.