Madame de Montespan said to me one day that it was a shame I had no ambition, and would not take part in anything.

I replied, “If a person should have intrigued assiduously to become Madame, could not her son permit her to enjoy that rank peaceably?  Well, then, fancy that I have become so by such means, and leave me to repose.”

“You are obstinate,” said she.

“No, Madame,” I answered; “but I love quiet, and I look upon all your ambition to be pure vanity.”

I thought she would have burst with spite, so angry was she.  She, however, continued,—­

“But make the attempt and we will assist you.”

“No,” I replied, “Madame, when I think that you, who have a hundred times more wit than I, have not been able to maintain your consequence in that Court which you love so much, what hope can I, a poor foreigner, have of succeeding, who know nothing of intrigue, and like it as little?”

She was quite mortified.  “Go along,” she said, “you are good for nothing.”

Old Maintenon and her party had instilled into the Dauphine a deep hatred against me; by their direction she often said very impertinent things to me.  They hoped that I should resent them to the Dauphine in such manner as to afford her reason to complain to the King of me, and thus draw his displeasure upon me.  But as I knew the tricks of the old woman and her coterie, I resolved not to give them that satisfaction; I only laughed at the disobliging manner in which they treated me, and I gave them to understand that I thought the ill behaviour of the Dauphine was but a trick of her childhood, which she would correct as she grew older.  When I spoke to her she made me no reply, and laughed at me with the ladies attendant upon her.

“Ladies,” she once said to them, “amuse me; I am tired;” and at the same time looked at me disdainfully.  I only smiled at her, as if her behaviour had no effect upon me.

I said, however, to old Maintenon, in a careless tone, “Madame la Dauphine receives me ungraciously; I do not intend to quarrel with her, but if she should become too rude I shall ask the King if he approves of her behaviour.”

The old woman was alarmed, because she knew very well that the King had enjoined the Dauphine always to behave politely to me; she begged me immediately not to say a word to the King, assuring me that I should soon see the Dauphine’s behaviour changed; and indeed, from that time, the Dauphine altered her conduct, and lived upon much better terms with me.  If I had complained to the King of the ill treatment I received from the Dauphine he would have been very angry; but she would not have hated me the less, and she and her old aunt would have formed means to repay me double.

Ratzenhausen has the good fortune to be sprung from a very good family; the King was always glad to see her, because she made him laugh; she also diverted the Dauphine, and Madame de Berri liked her much, and made her visit her frequently.  It is not surprising that we should be good friends; we have been so since our infancy, for I was not nine years old when I first became acquainted with her.  Of all the old women I know, there is not one who keeps up her gaiety like Linor.