“Lizette,” said she, “has made a delightful visit.”  And then she told all that I had done, which made the Electress laugh even more than the Queen.  She called me to her and said,—­

“Lizette, you have done right; you have revenged us well for the haughtiness of the Princess.”

My brother would have had me marry the Margrave of Dourlach, but I had no inclination towards him because he was affected, which I never could bear.  He knew very well that I was not compelled to refuse him, for he was married long before they thought of marrying me to Monsieur.  Still he thought fit to send to me a Doctor of Dourlach, for the purpose of asking me whether he ought to obey his father and marry the Princess of Holstein.  I replied that he could not do better than to obey his father; that he had promised me nothing, nor had I pledged myself to him; but that, nevertheless, I was obliged to him for the conduct he had thought fit to adopt.  This is all that passed between us.

Once they wanted to give me to the Duke of Courlande; it was my aunt d’Hervod who wished to make that match.  He was in love with Marianne, the daughter of Duke Ulric of Wurtemberg; but his father and mother would not allow him to marry her because they had fixed their eyes on me.  When, however, he came back from France on his way home, I made such an impression on him that he would not hear of marriage, and requested permission to join the army.

I once received a very sharp scolding in a short journey from Mannheim to Heidelberg.  I was in the carriage with my late father, who had with him an envoy, from the Emperor, the Count of Konigseck.  At this time I was as thin and light as I am now fat and heavy.  The jolting of the carriage threw me from my seat, and I fell upon the Count; it was not my fault, but I was nevertheless severely rebuked for it, for my father was not a man to be trifled with, and it was always necessary to be very circumspect in his presence.

When I think of conflagrations I am seized with a shivering fit, for I remember how the Palatinate was ravaged for more than three months.  Whenever I went to sleep I used to think I saw Heidelberg all in flames; then I used to wake with a start, and I very narrowly escaped an illness in consequence of those outrages.

     [The burning of the Palatinate in 1674—­a horrible devastation
     commanded by Louis, and executed by Turenne.]

Upon my arrival in France I was made to hold a conference with three bishops.  They all differed in their creeds, and so, taking the quintessence of their opinions, I formed a religion of my own.

It was purely from the affection I bore to her that I refused to take precedence of our late Electress; but making always a wide distinction between her aid and the Duchess of Mecklenbourg, as well as our Electress of Hanover, I did not hesitate to do so with respect to both the latter.  I also would not take precedence of my mother.  In my childhood I wished to bear her train, but she would never permit me.