Three footmen had a quarrel together; two of them refused to admit the third to their table, saying, “as he and his master only serve a president’s wife, he cannot presume to compare himself with us, who serve Princesses and Duchesses.”  The rejected footman called another fellow to his aid, and a violent squabble ensued.  The commissaire was called:  he found that they served three brothers, the sons of a rich merchant at Rouen; two of them had bought companies in the French Guards; one of the two had an intrigue with the wife of Duc d’Abret, and the other with the Duchesse de Luxembourg, while the third was only engaged with the wife of a president.  The two former were called Colande and Maigremont; and, as at the same time the Duc d’Abret, the son of the Duc de Bouillon, was in love with the lady of the President Savari.

The Envoy from Holstein, M. Dumont, was very much attached to Madame de La Rochefoucauld, one of Madame de Berri’s ‘dames du palais’.  She was very pretty, but gifted with no other than personal charms.  Some one was joking her on this subject, and insinuated that she had treated her lover very favourably.  “Oh! no,” she replied, “that is impossible, I assure you, entirely impossible.”  When she was urged to say what constituted the impossibility, she replied, “If I tell, you will immediately agree with me that it is quite impossible.”  Being pressed still further, she said, with a very serious air, “Because he is a Protestant!”

When the marriage of Monsieur was declared, he said to Saint-Remi, “Did you know that I was married to the Princesse de Lorraine?”—­

“No, Monsieur,” replied the latter; “I knew very well that you lived with her, but I did not think you would have married her.”

Queen Marie de Medicis, the wife of Henri IV., was one day walking at the Tuileries with her son, the Dauphin, when the King’s mistress came into the garden, having also her son with her.  The mistress said very, insolently, to the Queen, “There are our two Dauphins walking together, but mine is a fairer one than yours” The Queen gave her a smart box on the ear, and said at the same time, “Let this impertinent woman be taken away.”  The mistress ran instantly to Henri IV. to complain, but the King, having heard her story, said, “This is your own fault; why did you not speak to the Queen with the respect which you owe to her?”

Madame de Fiennes, who in her youth had been about the Queen-mother, used always to say to the late Monsieur, “The Queen, your mother, was a very silly woman; rest her soul!” My aunt, the Abbess of Maubuisson, told me that she saw at the Queen’s a man who was called “the repairer of the Queen’s face;” that Princess, as well as all the ladies of the Court, wore great quantities of paint.

On account of the great services which the House of Arpajon in France had rendered to the Order of Malta, a privilege was formerly granted that the second son of that family, should at his birth become a Knight of the Order without the necessity of any proof or any inquiry as to his mother.