[Her pride led her into all sorts of follies.  She once went through Paris preceded by trumpets and drama; and on another occasion she appeared at the theatre under a canopy.  She received the Venetian Ambassador sitting in a chair elevated upon a sort of a platform.  This haughtiness, however, did not prevent her from keeping very bad company, and she would sometimes lay aside her singularities and break up her orgies to pass some holy days at the Carmelites.]

From the age of eight years she has had entirely her own way, so that it is not surprising she should be like a headstrong horse.  If she had been well brought up, she would have been a worthy character, for she has very good sense and a good natural disposition, and is not at all like her mother, to whom, although she was very severely treated, she always did her duty.  During her mother’s last illness, she watched her like a hired nurse.  If Madame de Berri had been surrounded by honest people, who thought more of her honour than of their own interest, she would have been a very admirable person.  She had excellent feelings; but as that old woman (Maintenon) once said, “bad company spoils good manners.”  To be pleasing she had only to speak, for she possessed natural eloquence, and could express herself very well.

Her complexion is very florid, for which she often lets blood, but without effect; she uses a great quantity of paint, I believe for the purpose of hiding the marks of the small-pox.  She cannot dance, and hates it; but she is well-grounded in music.  Her voice is neither strong nor agreeable, and yet she sings very correctly.  She takes as much diversion as possible; one day she hunts, another day she goes out in a carriage, on a third she will go to a fair; at other times she frequents the rope-dancers, the plays, and the operas, and she goes everywhere ‘en echarpe’, and without stays.  I often rally her, and say that she fancies she is fond of the chase, but in fact she only likes changing her place.  She cares little about the result of the chase, but she likes boar-hunting better than stag-hunting, because the former furnishes her table with black puddings and boars’ heads.

I do not reckon the Duchesse de Berri among my grandchildren.  She is separated from me, we live like strangers to each other, she does not disturb herself about me, nor I about her. (7th January, 1716.)

Madame de Maintenon was so dreadfully afraid lest the King should take a fancy to the Duchesse de Berri while the Dauphine was expected, that she did her all sorts of ill offices.  After the Dauphine’s death she repaired the wrong; but then, to tell the truth, the King’s inclination was not so strong.

If the Duchesse de Berri was not my daughter-in-law, I should have no reason to be dissatisfied with her; she behaves politely to me, which is all that I can say. (25th Sept., 1716.)

She often laughs at her own figure and shape.  She has certainly good sense, and is not very punctilious.  Her flesh is firm and healthy, her cheeks are as hard as stone.  I should be ungrateful not to love her, for she does all sorts of civil things towards me, and displays so great a regard for me that I am often quite amazed at it. (12th April, 1718.)