In the great apartments there were persons of the highest rank who sought permission to pass the night on benches, so that they might be all there and prepared on the following day.  On the two sides of the great gallery they had raised tribunes in steps, draped in ‘Cramoisi’ velvet.  It was on these steps, which were entirely new, that all the ladies were placed.  The lords stood upright below them, and formed a double hedge on each side.

When his Majesty appeared on his throne, the fire of the diamonds with which he was covered for a moment dazzled all eyes.  The King seemed to me less animated than was his wont; but his fine appearance, which never quits him, rendered him sufficiently fit for such a representation and his part in it.

The Doge of the humiliated Republic exhibited neither obsequiousness nor pride.  We found his demeanour that of a philosopher prepared for all human events.  His colleagues walked after him, but at a little distance.  When the Doge Lescaro had asked for pardon, as he had submitted to do, two of his senators fell to weeping.  The King, who noticed the general emotion, descended from his throne and spoke for some minutes with the five personages, and, smiling on them with his most seductive grace, he once more drew all hearts to him.

I was placed at two paces from Madame de Maintenon.  The Doge,—­who was never left by a master of ceremonies, who named the ladies to him,—­in passing before me, made a profound reverence.  He then drew near Madame de Maintenon, who heard all his compliments, said to him, in Italian, all that could be said, and did him the honour to lean on his hand when descending from her tribune to return to the King’s.

On the next day the Doge and senators came to present their homage to my children, and did not forget me in their visits of ceremony.

CHAPTER XLV.

The Comte de Vermandois.—­His Entrance into the World.—­Quarrels with the Dauphin.—­Duel.—­Siege of Courtrai.—­The Cathedral of Arras.

When Madame de la Valliere (led by suggestions coming from the Most High) left the Court and the world to shut herself up in a cloister, she committed a great imprudence; I should not know how to repeat it:  The Carmelites in the Rue Saint Jacques could easily do without her; her two poor little children could not.  The King confided them, I am well aware, to governors and governesses who were prudent, attentive, and capable; but all the governors and preceptors in the world will never replace a mother,—­above all, in a place of dissipation, tumult, and carelessness like the Court.

M. le Comte de Vermandois was only seven years old when exaggerated scruples and bad advice deprived him of his mother.  This amiable child, who loved her, at first suffered much from her absence and departure.  He had to be taken to the Carmelites, where the sad metamorphosis of his mother, whom he had seen so brilliant and alluring, made him start back in fright.