the company, which had gathered at the door of the chateau to see the fun, ran to her assistance, in order to have the pleasure of enjoying the scene more fully.  Thereupon she set to abusing everybody right and left, commencing with Monseigneur and Madame la Duchesse de Bourgogne.  At another time M. de Bourgogne put a cracker under her chair in the salon, where she was playing at piquet.  As he was about to set fire to this cracker, some charitable soul warned him that it would maim her, and he desisted.

Sometimes they used to send about twenty Swiss guards, with drums, into her chamber, who roused her from her first sleep by their horrid din.  Another time—­and these scenes were always at Marly—­they waited until very late for her to go to bed and sleep.  She lodged not far from the post of the captain of the guards, who was at that time the Marechal de Lorges.  It had snowed very hard, and had frozen.  Madame la Duchesse de Bourgogne and her suite gathered snow from the terrace which is on a level with their lodgings; and, in order to be better supplied, waked up, to assist them, the Marechal’s people, who did not let them want for ammunition.  Then, with a false key, and lights, they gently slipped into the chamber of the Princesse d’Harcourt; and, suddenly drawing the curtains of her bed, pelted her amain with snowballs.  The filthy creature, waking up with a start, bruised and stifled in snow, with which even her ears were filled, with dishevelled hair, yelling at the top of her voice, and wriggling like an eel, without knowing where to hide, formed a spectacle that diverted people more than half an hour:  so that at last the nymph swam in her bed, from which the water flowed everywhere, slushing all the chamber.  It was enough to make one die of laughter.  On the morrow she sulked, and was more than ever laughed at for her pains.

Her fits of sulkiness came over her either when the tricks played were too violent, or when M. le Grand abused her.  He thought, very properly, that a person who bore the name of Lorraine should not put herself so much on the footing of a buffoon; and, as he was a rough speaker, he sometimes said the most abominable things to her at table; upon which the Princess would burst out crying, and then, being enraged, would sulk.  The Duchesse de Bourgogne used then to pretend to sulk, too; but the other did not hold out long, and came crawling back to her, crying, begging pardon for having sulked, and praying that she might not cease to be a source of amusement!  After some time the Duchess would allow herself to be melted, and the Princess was more villainously treated than ever, for the Duchesse de Bourgogne had her own way in everything.  Neither the King nor Madame de Maintenon found fault with what she did, so that the Princesse d’Harcourt had no resource; she did not even dare to complain of those who aided in tormenting her; yet it would not have been prudent in any one to make her an enemy.