A strange adventure, which happened at this time, terrified everybody, and gave rise to many surmises.  Savary was found assassinated in his house at Paris he kept only a valet and a maid-servant, and they were discovered murdered at the same time, quite dressed, like their master, and in different parts of the house.  It appeared by writings found there, that the crime was one of revenge:  it was supposed to have been committed in broad daylight.  Savary was a citizen of Paris, very rich, without occupation, and lived like an epicurean.  He had some friends of the highest rank, and gave parties, of all kinds of pleasure, at his house, politics sometimes being discussed.  The cause of this assassination was never known; but so much of it was found out, that no one dared to search for more.  Few doubted but that the deed had been done by a very ugly little man, but of a blood so highly respected, that all forms were dispensed with, in the fear lest it should be brought home to him; and, after the first excitement, everybody ceased to speak of this tragic history.

On the night between the 3rd and 4th of June, a daring robbery was effected at the grand stables of Versailles.  All the horse-cloths and trappings, worth at least fifty thousand crowns, were carried off, and so cleverly and with such speed, although the night was short, that no traces of them could ever afterwards be found.  This theft reminds me of another which took place a little before the commencement of these memoirs.  The grand apartment at Versailles, that is to say, from the gallery to the tribune, was hung with crimson velvet, trimmed and fringed with gold.  One fine morning the fringe and trimmings were all found to have been cut away.  This appeared extraordinary in a place so frequented all day, so well closed at night, and so well guarded at all times.  Bontems, the King’s valet, was in despair, and did his utmost to discover the thieves, but without success.

Five or six days afterwards, I was at the King’s supper, with nobody but Daqum, chief physician, between the King and me, and nobody at all between one and the table.  Suddenly I perceived a large black form in the air, but before I could tell what it was, it fell upon the end of the King’s table just before the cover which had been laid for Monseigneur and Madame.  By the noise it made in falling, and the weight of the thing itself, it seemed as though the table must be broken.  The plates jumped up, but none were upset, and the thing, as luck would have it, did not fall upon any of them, but simply upon the cloth.  The King moved his head half round, and without being moved in any way said, “I think that is my fringe!”