Our late King told me the following anecdote of Queen Christina of Sweden:  That Princess, instead of putting on a nightcap, wrapped her head up in a napkin.  One night she could not sleep, and ordered the musicians to be brought into her bedroom; where, drawing the bed-curtains, she could not be seen by the musicians, but could hear them at her ease.  At length, enchanted at a piece which they had just played, she abruptly thrust her head beyond the curtains, and cried out, “Mort diable! but they sing delightfully!” At this grotesque sight, the Italians, and particularly the castrati, who are not the bravest men in the world, were so frightened that they were obliged to stop short.

In the great gallery at Fontainebleau may still be seen the blood of the man whom she caused to be assassinated; it was to prevent his disclosing some secrets of which he was in possession that she deprived him of life.  He had, in fact, begun to chatter through jealousy of another person who had gained the Queen’s favour.  Christina was very vindictive, and given up to all kinds of debauchery.

Duke Frederick Augustus of Brunswick was delighted with Christina; he said that he had never in his life met a woman who had so much wit, and whose conversation was so truly diverting; he added that it was impossible to be dull with her for a moment.  I observed to him that the Queen in her conversation frequently indulged in very filthy discussions.  “That is true,” replied he, “but she conceals such things in so artful a manner as to take from them all their disgusting features.”  She never could be agreeable to women, for she despised them altogether.

Saint Francois de Sales, who founded the order of the Sisters of Saint Mary, had in his youth been extremely intimate with the Marechal de Villeroi, the father of the present Marshal.  The old gentleman could therefore never bring himself to call his old friend a saint.  When any one spoke in his presence of Saint Francois de Sales, he used to say, “I was delighted when I saw M. de Sales become a saint; he used to delight in talking indecently, and always cheated at play; but in every other respect he was one of the best gentlemen in the world, and perhaps one of the most foolish.”

M. de Cosnac, Archbishop of Aix, was at a very advanced age when he learnt that Saint Francois de Sales had been canonized.  “What!” cried he, “M. de Geneve, my old friend?  I am delighted at his good fortune; he was a gallant man, an amiable man, and an honest man, too, although he would sometimes cheat at piquet, at which we have often played together.”—­“But, sir,” said some one present, “is it possible that a saint could be a sharper at play?”—­“No,” replied the Archbishop, “he said, as a reason for it, that he gave all his winnings to the poor.” [Loisirs d’un homme d’etat, et Dictionnaire Historique, tom. vii.  Paris, 1810.]

While Frederick Charles de Wurtemberg, the administrateur of that duchy, was staying at Paris, the Princesse Marianne de Wurtemberg, Duke Ulric’s daughter, was there also with her mother.  Expecting then to marry her cousin,