The two plots, therefore, to overthrow the minister and to weaken the
influence of the dauphiness, went hand-in-hand, and, as might have been
expected from the character of the patroness of both, no means were too
vile or wicked for the intriguers who had set them on foot. Madame du
Barri was, indeed, seriously alarmed for the maintenance of her own
ascendency. The king took such undisguised pleasure in his new
granddaughter's company, that some of the most experienced courtiers began
to anticipate that she would soon gain entire influence over him[6]. The
mistress began, therefore, to disparage her personal charms, never
speaking of her to Louis ("France," as she generally called him), except
as "the little blowsy,[7]" while her ally, De la Vauguyon, endeavored to
further her views by exerting the influence which he mistakenly flattered
himself that he still retained over the dauphin, to surround her with his
own creatures. He tried to procure the dismissal of the Abbé de Vermond,
who, having been, as we have seen, the tutor of Marie Antoinette at
Vienna, still remained attached to her person as her reader; and whose
complete knowledge of all the ways of the court, joined to a thorough
honesty and devoted fidelity to her best interests, rendered his services
most valuable to his mistress in her new sphere. He sought to recommend a
creature of his own as her confessor; to obtain for his own daughter the
appointment of one of her chief ladies; and, with a wickedness peculiar to
the French court, he even endeavored to imitate the vile arts by which the
Duc de Richelieu had deprived Marie Leczinska of the affections of the
king, to alienate the dauphin from his young wife, and to induce him to
commit himself to the guidance of Madame du Barri. But this part of the
scheme failed. The dauphin was strangely insensible to the personal charms
of Marie Antoinette herself, and was wholly inaccessible to any inferior
temptations; and, as far as the arrangements of the court were concerned,
the success of the mistress's cabal was limited to procuring the dismissal