Old Maintenon said to me angrily, “Do you think you know better than all these medical men?”

“No, Madame,” I replied; “and one need not know much to be sure that the inclination of nature ought to be followed; and since that has displayed itself it would be better to let it have way, than to make a sick person get up in the midst of a perspiration to be blooded.”

She shrugged up her shoulders ironically.  I went to the other side and said nothing.

SECTION XIV.—­THE FIRST DAUPHIN.

All that was good in the first Dauphin came from his preceptor; all that was bad from himself.  He never either loved or hated any one much, and yet he was very wicked.  His greatest pleasure was to do something to vex a person; and immediately afterwards, if he could do something very pleasing to the same person, he would set about it with great willingness.  In every respect he was of the strangest temper possible:  when one thought he was good-humoured, he was angry; and when one supposed him to be ill-humoured, he was in an amiable mood.  No one could ever guess him rightly, and I do not believe that his like ever was or ever will be born.  It cannot be said that he had much wit; but still less was he a fool.  Nobody was ever more prompt to seize the ridiculous points of anything in himself or in others; he told stories agreeably; he was a keen observer, and dreaded nothing so much as to be one day King:  not so much from affection for his father, as from a dread of the trouble of reigning, for he was so extremely idle that he neglected all things; and he would have preferred his ease to all the kingdoms and empires of the earth.  He could remain for a whole day, sitting on a sofa or in an arm-chair, beating his cane against his shoes, without saying a word; he never gave an opinion upon any subject; but when once, in the course of the year, he did speak, he could express himself in terms sufficiently noble.  Sometimes when he spoke one would say he was stupidity itself; at another time he would deliver himself with astonishing sense.  At one time you would think he was the best Prince in the world; at another he would do all he could to give people pain.  Nobody seemed to be so ill with him but he would take the trouble of making them laugh at the expense of those most dear to him.  His maxim was, never to seem to like one man in the Court better than another.  He had a perfect horror of favourites, and yet he sought favour himself as much as the commonest courtier could do.  He did not pride himself upon his politeness, and was enraged when any one penetrated his intentions.  As I had known him from his infancy I could sometimes guess his meaning, which angered him excessively.  He was not very fond of being treated respectfully; he liked better not to be put to any trouble.  He was rather partial than just, as may be shown by the regulations he made as to the rank of my son’s