The captain was ill for several days, and even in danger, in consequence of this adventure, which did not improve the credit of M. le Prince de Conti, much as it needed improvement.

His young and beautiful wife excused him in everything, ignoring, and wishing to ignore, the extent of his guilt and frivolity.

CHAPTER XXXI.

A Funeral and Diversions.—­Sinister Dream.—­Funeral Orations of the Queen.

It remains for me to relate certain rather curious circumstances in relation to the late Queen, after which I shall speak of her no more in these Memoirs.

She was left for ten days, lying in state, in the mortuary chapel of Versailles, where mass was being said by priests at four altars from morning till evening.  She was finally removed from this magnificent Palace of Enchantment to Saint Denis.  Numerous carriages followed the funeral car, and in all these carriages were the high officials, as well as the ladies, who had belonged to her.  But what barbarity! what ingratitude! what a scandal!  In all these mournful carriages, people talked and laughed and made themselves agreeable; and the body-guards, as well as the gendarmes and musketeers, took turns to ride their horses into the open plain and shoot at the birds.

Monsieur le Dauphin, after Saint Denis, went to lie at the Tuileries, before betaking himself to the service on the following day at Notre Dame.  In the evening, instead of remaining alone and in seclusion in his apartment, as a good son ought to have done, he went to the Palais Royal to see the Princess Palatine and her husband, whom he had had with him all the day; he must have distraction, amusement, and even merry conversations, such as simple bourgeois would not permit themselves on so solemn an occasion, were it only out of decorum.

In the midst of these ridiculous and indefensible conversations, the news arrived that the King had broken his arm.  The Marquis de Mosny had started on the instant in order to inform the young Prince of it; and Du Saussoi, equerry of his Majesty, arrived half an hour later, giving the same news with the details.

The King (who was hunting during the obsequies of his wife) had fallen off his horse, which he had not been able to prevent from stumbling into a ditch full of tall grass and foliage.  M. Felix, a skilful and prudent surgeon, had just set the arm, which was only put out of joint.  The King sent word to the Dauphin not to leave the Tuileries, and to attend the funeral ceremony on the morrow.

The fair of Saint Laurence was being held at this moment, although the city of Paris had manifested an intention of postponing it.  They were exhibiting to the curious a little wise horse which bowed, calculated, guessed, answered questions, and performed marvels.  The King had strictly forbidden his family and the people of the Court to let themselves be seen at this fair.  Monsieur le Dauphin, none the less, wished to contemplate, with his own eyes, this extraordinary and wonderful little horse.  Consequently, he had to be taken to the Chateau des Tuileries, where he took a puerile amusement in a spectacle in itself trivial, and, at such a time, scandalous.