The Comte de la Marche, a prince of the blood--Madame de Beauvoir, his
mistress--Madame du Barry complains to the prince de Soubise of the princess
de Guemenee--The king consoles the countess for this--The duc de Choiseul--
The king speaks to him of madame du Barry--Voltaire writes to her--The opinions
of Richelieu and the king concerning Voltaire
Amongst those personages who came to compliment me on the evening of my
presentation was M. the comte de la Marche, son of the prince du Conti, and
consequently prince of the blood. He had long been devoted to the will of Louis
XV. As soon as his most serene highness had wind of my favor he hastened to
add to the number of my court; and I leave you to imagine how greatly I was
flattered at seeing it augmented by so august a personage.
This conquest was most valuable in my eyes, for I thus proved to the world, that
by attracting the king to me I did not isolate him from the whole of his family. It is
very true that for some time the comte de la Marche had been out of favor with
the public, by reason of his over complaisance towards the ministers of the king's
pleasure; but he was not the less a prince of the blood, and at Versailles this rank
compensated for almost every fault. He was a lively man, moreover, his society
was agreeable, and the title he bore reflected his distinction amongst a crowd of
courtiers. I felt, therefore, that I ought to consider myself as very fortunate that he
deigned to visit me, and accordingly received him with all the civility I could
display; and the welcome reception which he always experienced drew him
frequently to my abode.
The friendship with which he honored me was not agreeable to my enemies; and
they tried by every possible means to seduce him from me. They got his near
relations to talk to him about it; his intimate friends to reason with him; the
females whom he most admired to dissuade him from it. There was not one of
these latter who did not essay to injure me in his estimation, by saying that he
dishonored himself by an acquaintance with me. There was amongst others a
marquise de Beauvoir, the issue of a petty nobility, whom he paid with sums of
gold, altho' she was not his mistress by title. Gained over by the Choiseuls, she
made proposals concerning me to the prince of so ridiculous a nature, that he
said to her impatiently: "I' faith, my dear, as in the eyes of the world every woman
who lives with a man who is not her husband is a ------, so I think a man is wise to
choose the loveliest he can find; and in this way the king is at this moment much
better off than any of his subjects."
Only imagine what a rage this put the marquise de Beauvoir in: she stormed,
wept, had a nervous attack. The comte de la Marche contemplated her with a
desperate tranquillity; but this scene continuing beyond the limits of tolerable
patience, he was so tired of it that he left her. This was not what the marquise
wished; and she hastened to write a submissive letter to him, in which, to justify
herself, she confessed to the prince, that in acting against me she had only
yielded to the instigations of the cabal, and particularly alluded to mesdames de
Grammont and de Guemenee.
