During the night, from Monday to Tuesday, the 9th of February, the lethargy was great.  During the day the King approached the bed many times:  the fever was strong, the awakenings were short; the head was confused, and some marks upon the skin gave tokens of measles, because they extended quickly, and because many people at Versailles and at Paris were known to be, at this time, attacked with that disease.  The night from Tuesday to Wednesday passed so much the more badly, because the hope of measles had already vanished.  The King came in the morning to see Madame la Dauphine, to whom an emetic had been given.  It operated well, but produced no relief.  The Dauphin, who scarcely ever left the bedside of his wife, was forced into the garden to take the air, of which he had much need; but his disquiet led him back immediately into the chamber.  The malady increased towards the evening, and at eleven o’clock there was a considerable augmentation of fever.  The night was very bad.  On Thursday, the 11th of February, at nine o’clock in the morning, the King entered the Dauphine’s chamber, which Madame de Maintenon scarcely ever left, except when he was in her apartments.  The Princess was so ill that it was resolved to speak to her of receiving the sacrament.  Prostrated though she was she was surprised at this.  She put some questions as to her state; replies as little terrifying as possible were given to her, and little by little she was warned against delay.  Grateful for this advice, she said she would prepare herself.

After some time, accidents being feared, Father la Rue, her (Jesuit) confessor, whom she had always appeared to like, approached her to exhort her not to delay confession.  She looked at him, replied that she understood him, and then remained silent.  Like a sensible man he saw what was the matter, and at once said that if she had any objection to confess to him to have no hesitation in admitting it.  Thereupon she indicated that she should like to have M. Bailly, priest of the mission of the parish of Versailles.  He was a man much esteemed, but not altogether free from the suspicion of Jansenism.  Bailly, as it happened, had gone to Paris.  This being told her, the Dauphine asked for Father Noel, who was instantly sent for.

The excitement that this change of confessor made at a moment so critical may be imagined.  All the cruelty of the tyranny that the King never ceased to exercise over every member of his family was now apparent.  They could not have a confessor not of his choosing!  What was his surprise and the surprise of all the Court, to find that in these last terrible moments of life the Dauphine wished to change her confessor, whose order even she repudiated!

Meanwhile the Dauphin had given way.  He had hidden his own illness as long as he could, so as not to leave the pillow of his Dauphine.  Now the fever he had was too strong to be dissimulated; and the doctors, who wished to spare him the sight of the horrors they foresaw, forgot nothing to induce him to stay in his chamber, where, to sustain him, false news was, from time to time, brought him of the state of his spouse.